Virtual Newsletter about Software Freedom

August 31, 2025

Anubis: In order to prevent bots to visit your website, you must prevent everyone else as well.
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There's a software that "weighs the soul" of HTTP requests called Anubis.
If you've interacted with the sites of GNOME, Linux, SourceWare, FFMpeg, FreeBSD, Wine, UNESCO (sadly), and more, you've probably heard of it.
But of course, the "perfect" software has it's issues.
Since it uses Proof of Work, it can take a VERY long time for some devices.

But there's also ethical issues.
Anubis is designed to pretect against bots, but mostly AI bots.
The company behind Anubis, owned by Xe, called Techaro, actively supports AI.
This doesn't really make much sense, does it?

Anubis, of course, provides "commercial solutions" for companies.
These cost MONEY.
You also can't redistribute those commercial solutions.
Making it proprietary.

But, there's a silver lining.
There's a software called `go-away`[1].
This is a free software that is like Anubis, but is much more user friendly.
It doesn't make the user do Proof of Work challenges that are creepily close to the way that Bitcoin works.
It also provides No JS challenges, for even more user freedom.

I will be deploying `go-away` on my website.

- NexusSfan

[1] https://git.gammaspectra.live/git/go-away

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Copyright (c) 2025 NexusSfan
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