How to prevent image hotlinking for Joomla using cPanel Print

Hotlink protection prevents other websites from linking to your images and files and thereby stealing your bandwidth

You'll need to be logged in to your cPanel account to enable hotlink protection for your Joomla installation

1) Click Hotlink Protection

 

 

cPanel should have automatically filled this box in for you. If that isn't the case, you'll need to type all domains and subdomains that should be able to access your files. Note that www is considered a subdomain and must be included explicitly

2) Add any additional domain names here

3) Now, specify any other file extensions for which to restrict access

 

Allowing direct requests lets people type the URL to a file in their browsers but not access it on a web page other than one specified

4) Click here to allow direct requests

 

By default, an error message will be displayed when someone triggers the hotlink protection. An alternative is to redirect the person to a URL specified here

 

5) Type a redirect URL here

6) Click Submit to activate Hotlink Protection

 

7) Click Go Back

 

 

With that done, hotlink protection is now enabled for all files in your public_html folder and every folder it contains. But what if you just want the Joomla folder to be protected?

 

8) Click Home

 

 

Scroll down

 

9) Click File Manager

 

10) Click Show Hidden Files

 

11) Click Go

 

12) The hotlink protection is saved in a file called .htaccess in the public_html folder. Right-click on it

13) Go to Copy

 

14) Now, enter the path to your Joomla directory and click Copy File(s)

 

 

Let's verify that the .htaccess file contains the correct information

 

15) Double-click on the Joomla directory

 

Scroll down until you see .htaccess

 

16) Click the checkbox...

17) ...then click Edit

 

18) Click Edit

 

 

This looks correct. Every domain name we entered shows up here...all the file types are here...and the redirect URL is here. If you enabled Direct Linking, this line will be here, too

19) Make any necessary changes, then click Save Changes

 

Now that Joomla has hotlink protection set up independently from cPanel, let's disable it there

 

20) Click Disable

 

 

That's all there is to it! Hotlink protection is now enabled only for your Joomla directory