Bottoll – AI Crawler Control
Bottoll – AI Crawler Control connects your WordPress website to the Bottoll service. It helps website administrators identify AI crawlers and govern how automated systems access public content.
With Bottoll, you can:
- Detect AI crawlers and agents.
- Allow or block requests according to policies configured in Bottoll.
- View request analytics in the Bottoll dashboard.
- Manage automated access to public WordPress content.
An active Bottoll account and API key are required. Analysis and access policies are configured from the Bottoll dashboard. If the Bottoll API cannot be reached, the plugin fails open so that the website remains available.
The service is disabled by default. The plugin does not contact Bottoll until a website administrator deliberately enters and saves a Bottoll API key.
External Service
This plugin relies on the external Bottoll API at api.bottoll.com. The
service provides AI crawler detection, request analytics, and enforcement of
the access policies configured by the website administrator. These functions
cannot be performed by the plugin without the Bottoll service.
Data sent to Bottoll
After a website administrator enters and saves an API key, the plugin sends the following information about eligible public GET requests to the Bottoll API:
- The API key associated with the website’s Bottoll account.
- Request method and protocol.
- Website host.
- Requested path and query string.
- Visitor IP address.
- User-Agent, Accept, and Accept-Language HTTP headers when available.
- HTTP referrer when available.
This information is sent before WordPress renders each eligible public GET request. It is used by Bottoll to identify AI crawlers, produce request analytics, and apply the access policies configured by the administrator.
The API key is also sent to the Bottoll API when the administrator saves the plugin configuration or manually tests the connection. No request data is sent while no API key is stored in the plugin settings.
Consent and disabling the service
Installing or activating the plugin alone does not contact the Bottoll API. Saving an API key is the administrator’s explicit action to connect the WordPress website to the Bottoll service. Request analysis and access policies must also be enabled from the administrator’s Bottoll account.
The administrator can opt out at any time by selecting “Disconnect Bottoll and remove API key” on the plugin settings page. This removes the locally stored API key and immediately stops communication between this WordPress plugin and the Bottoll API. It does not revoke the key in the Bottoll account.
Service provider and policies
The external service is provided by Bottoll:
For setup and service documentation, see the Bottoll WordPress documentation.