Google has recently implemented new security measures for its search engine to counter the influence of bots and other crawlers. The core of this new safeguard is requiring users to enable JavaScript in their browsers.
JavaScript scripts are commonly used to enhance web page interactivity. They are also employed to detect malicious activities; for example, requests that do not support JavaScript might indicate non-human access and can thus be blocked.
For privacy reasons, a small fraction of users had previously disabled JavaScript while using Google Search, as these scripts are also utilized by Google to collect user data. Until now, Google allowed such use without enforcing JavaScript. However, moving forward, users will no longer be able to access Google Search unless JavaScript is enabled. An official Google spokesperson emphasized that many search functionalities would be unavailable without JavaScript.
Google’s own data indicates that less than 0.1% of Google Search traffic comes from users who have JavaScript disabled. Yet, considering Google handles up to 8.5 billion searches daily, even 0.1% represents a substantial number of queries.
The change is likely to impact users of privacy-focused browsers like Tor, which often recommend disabling JavaScript to prevent tracking. These users typically access Google Search for legitimate purposes rather than abuse, such as attempts to exploit the search platform.
Meanwhile, SEO industry discussions, such as those on the Search Engine Roundtable, suggest that Google’s crackdown on JavaScript-disabled usage primarily targets crawlers. These bots scrape Google’s search results in headless mode to analyze keyword rankings and other metrics. With the requirement for JavaScript enabled, some ranking analysis tools have already encountered difficulties.
Although Google has not outright banned such crawlers, SEO tools will now need to adapt to JavaScript requirements to continue fetching data. However, tools with excessively high scraping frequencies may still face bans from Google.
Via: TechCrunch
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