Nowadays, Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) communities are facing a growing challenge: AI-driven crawlers dominating web traffic.
These crawlers overwhelm servers, scrape data, and cause performance issues. In some cases, they even take down a project’s infrastructure, causing outages or forcing the blocking of entire countries to mitigate the damage. As this issue continues to grow, FOSS communities need a reliable (and cost-effective) solution to protect their resources and ensure long-term stability.
To help combat this challenge, we introduced the AI Crawlers Blocklist in February of this year. This blocklist is designed to detect and block malicious AI crawlers that scrape and overload websites and can help FOSS communities reduce the unwanted traffic from AI bots and make their projects stable again for their members.
However, since this blocklist is part of our Platinum Blocklists plan, we realize that can be quite spendy and impossible for open source projects to afford.
Announcing free access to the Platinum AI Crawlers Blocklist for all FOSS projects
Open source is the essence of the CrowdSec DNA. Everyone on the CrowdSec team believes that open source communities are critical to the ecosystem and we will always strive to give back to the FOSS community and support open source projects in any shape or form we can.
We know how challenging it can be to manage a project that relies on public collaboration while operating with limited resources. That is why allowing free access to one of our most valuable blocklists for open source projects was a no-brainer.
How to access the AI Crawlers Blocklist
CrowdSec Blocklists don’t require the integration of a specific WAF or service into your stack.
You just need to feed the blocklist to your existing firewall, proxy, or CDN. For more details, check out this article. Although the AI Crawlers Blocklist is part of our Platinum Blocklists plan, we offer it at no cost to FOSS communities, and here’s how you can access it:
- Reach out: Contact us at community@crowdsec.com and let us know you’re interested.
- Tell us about your project: Share a bit about your open source project so we can better understand how the blocklist can help.
- Get access: Once approved, you will receive access to the blocklist via the CrowdSec Console.
We are safer together!
At CrowdSec, we’re committed to making the internet a safer space for everyone. The rise of AI-driven crawlers brings a significant threat to open source projects and the open source communities we dearly love and support.
That’s why we won’t let you face this new challenge alone! By making this blocklist available at no cost for FOSS communities, we want to support the open source ecosystem as a whole while also increasing awareness about the importance of community-driven security.
Stay safe out there, and don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any questions or feedback on our Discourse or Discord.
