posted in Technology

This free font can trick AI scrapers into swallowing gibberish instead of your content

Most mass scrapers, on the other hand, simply grab the raw HTML underneath. ShieldFont exploits this difference through an automated process called OpenType glyph substitution.

That said, because the whole defense rests on scrapers reading code rather than screens, taking a screenshot of a shielded page and running OCR on the image can still recover the real words.

Screen readers used by blind readers also work from the code, so they read the decoys aloud. ShieldFont ships with a beta feature that provides those readers with the real text instead.

www.techspot.com/news/113316-shieldfont-tricks-web-scrapers-swallowing-gibberish-instead-content.html
TechSpotThis free font can trick AI scrapers into swallowing gibberish instead of your contentA Brazilian creative studio called Seneda & Abrucio has teamed up with Playtype, a Copenhagen-based type foundry, to build something that doesn't rely on asking nicely to...

Replying to @⁨FTonsilStones@lemmy.ca⁩

If this gets any adoption, it will work for about a week, after which scrapers will just detect the font, and do a reverse lookup of its mapping table.

Ironic that the repo of the font is also AI slop. If the author had asked any competent person how viable the solution is, instead of a sycophantic AI, they would have just gotten a laugh instead.

A web font that protects written content from AI scraping — humans see the text, scrapers see a plausible decoy. - isaqueseneda/shieldfontGitHubshieldfont/MAPPINGS.md at main · isaqueseneda/shieldfontA web font that protects written content from AI scraping — humans see the text, scrapers see a plausible decoy. - isaqueseneda/shieldfont
Edited ⁨⁨Aug⁩ ⁨1⁩, ⁨2026⁩, ⁨08:53⁩⁩en