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algoth1yesterday at 9:17 PM2 repliesview on HN

TLDR: Perplexity agents allegedly ignored Amazon's robots.txt


Replies

Zambyteyesterday at 9:26 PM

robots.txt is a suggestion, not a rule. It's a service to crawlers to help them avoid wasting time. Using robots.txt as a security measure is like trying to stop a foreign invader with a "road closed" sign.

Edit: this is obviously assuming they literally meant robots.txt, but from a qyick skim of the site, it doesn't look like that was mentioned at least. I guess you meant it metaphorically :P

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j4kp07yesterday at 9:19 PM

Why should they not? So does my browser when I ask it to open a website.