Yes I think you misunderstood or more likely I poorly worded the post. White listing is better than black listing. Black listing something you don't want googlebot to index just makes it easier for someone to find something you don't want indexed. If that content is sensitive, it probably should not be publicly accessible in the first place. But people never put sensitive content on web server (weak attempt at humor, my apologies). I am beating the dead horse here, but robots.txt is not a security control. Most of the time robots.txt is great for recon sense and not Amy measure of defense.
White listing just helps in not exposing too much information, a speed bump if anything security related. I think this falls under the 'defense in depth' heading. -----Original Message----- From: full-disclosure-boun...@lists.grok.org.uk [mailto:full-disclosure-boun...@lists.grok.org.uk] On Behalf Of Christoph Gruber Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2012 3:19 AM To: full-disclosure@lists.grok.org.uk Subject: Re: [Full-disclosure] Google's robots.txt handling On 12.12.2012 at 00:23 "Lehman, Jim" <jim.leh...@interactivedata.com> wrote: > It is possible to use white listing for robots.txt. Allow what you want > google to index and deny everything else. That way google doesn't make you a > goole dork target and someone browsing to your robots.txt file doesn't glean > any sensitive files or folders. But this will not stop directory bruting to > discover your publicly exposed sensitive data, that probably should not be > exposed to the web in the first place. Maybe I misunderstood something, but do you really think that "sensitive" can be hidden in "secret" directories on publicly reachable web servers? -- Christoph Gruber By not reading this email you don't agree you're not in any way affiliated with any government, police, ANTI- Piracy Group, RIAA, MPAA, or any other related group, and that means that you CANNOT read this email. By reading you are not agreeing to these terms and you are violating code 431.322.12 of the Internet Privacy Act signed by Bill Clinton in 1995. (which doesn't exist) _______________________________________________ Full-Disclosure - We believe in it. Charter: http://lists.grok.org.uk/full-disclosure-charter.html Hosted and sponsored by Secunia - http://secunia.com/ ******************************************************* This message (including any files transmitted with it) may contain confidential and/or proprietary information, is the property of Interactive Data Corporation and/or its subsidiaries, and is directed only to the addressee(s). If you are not the designated recipient or have reason to believe you received this message in error, please delete this message from your system and notify the sender immediately. An unintended recipient's disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of this message or any attachments is prohibited and may be unlawful. ******************************************************* _______________________________________________ Full-Disclosure - We believe in it. Charter: http://lists.grok.org.uk/full-disclosure-charter.html Hosted and sponsored by Secunia - http://secunia.com/
