If I block a country like China from accessing my site using htaccess what are the chances that I will block also visitors from western countries like the US, UK and Canada?
ang_panday
8:18 am on May 5, 2010 (gmt 0)
... By the way, I'll be using IP addresses generated from [countryipblocks.net...]
g1smd
8:25 am on May 5, 2010 (gmt 0)
The chances are quite low, but I once blocked Asia and Africa by design and found that some users in Australia were also locked out by accident.
So, you need some way for people to still see a "contact" page so they can get hold of you if they are genuine. Users in Asia and Africa were being fed a three page 'fake' website that made no hint of any ecom operation. Only Europe, Australia and New Zealand, and the Americas get to see the real site.
Within days of the lockdown there were several emails from Australia complaining they could not access the site. It was easy to get those people to report their IP address and unlock that range.
ang_panday
9:06 am on May 5, 2010 (gmt 0)
Australia & New Zealand is part of asia and that is why some of your viewers cannot view your site. I'am on the online retail business and I have been having some problems from competitors in china were I import my goods. I always see them on my web-stat.
My only concern is if I block China I would also be blocking countries that are welcome to surf my site. Majority of my buyers are from the US ( around 90% )and the rest are from Europe.
I do not mind if I loose a few from other parts of asia, but not the US and UK .
lammert
12:02 pm on May 5, 2010 (gmt 0)
IP addresses are assigned by a few large Regional Internet Registries. As long as your legitimate visitors are from another Regional Internet Registry than the one you want to block, the chances that you accidentily lock out legitimate visitors is quite low. this is because the IP address blocks assigned to the regional registries are relatively large and there are not much smaller blocks exchanged between these registries. The service areas of the registries sometimes change (ARIN formerly covered parts of Africa and Latin America for example), but currently there is the following division:
ARIN: North America and parts of the Caribbean RIPE: Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia APNIC: Asia and the Pacific region LACNIC: Latin America and parts of the Caribbean AfriNIC: Africa
In your case, blocking APNIC addresses will not interfere with your customers in the ARIN and RIPE service area. You should take into account that some countries in Asia which are known for inappropriate Internet traffic like Russia, are in the RIPE service area.
