Ask Is my clients competitor redirecting bots to their domain with a firewall rule?

[Brajet]

was looking at the raw access on my clients server and I noticed 301 redirect entries which contained their competitors domain. Does this mean that the redirect is coming from the competitors server or mine?

(I'm logging a few per day on average, here is an example from my blue host raw access logs, domains and destination IP obscured) ,,,,-

52.104.117.138 - - [06/Jan/2022:11:40:49 -0700] "HEAD /%20https://competitors-site.com/ HTTP/1.1" 301 - "-" "-" my-site.com xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

52.104.117.138 - - [06/Jan/2022:11:40:50 -0700] "HEAD /%20https:/ competitors-site.com/ HTTP/1.1" 404 - "-" "-" my-site.com xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

,,,,-

All the requests are coming from domains which seem to be cloud computing (Azure, AWs). I am still new at troubleshooting logs but my suspicion is that they are setting a firewall rule to redirect bots in bad faith.

Please let me know what you think. I know the competitors company owns it

 

[Anthony Joshua]

From what I can see in your logs, the 301 and 404 entries do not necessarily mean the redirects are coming from the competitor's server. Most likely, bots or scripts are making requests to your server that include the competitor's domain in the URL path. The fact that the IPs are from cloud providers like AWS or Azure suggests automated scanning or bot traffic. It's unlikely a competitor can force a redirect from their server to your site. You might want to block or rate-limit suspicious IPs.

 

[Felix😎]

My recommendation would be to thoroughly investigate the origin of these redirects and take appropriate action to block or mitigate the issue. This may involve configuring your client's server firewall to detect and prevent such unauthorized redirects. Additionally, you could consider reaching out to the competitor's company to address the concern and find a resolution.

Proactively addressing this potential threat can help protect your client's online presence and ensure that their website traffic and revenue are not adversely impacted by the competitor's actions.