Merge branch 'ly/pack-bitmap-load-leakfix': The Unseen Struggle Against AI Scraping

As you're reading this, you may be wondering what's behind the unusual measures being taken by the administrator of this website. It's not an ad or a pop-up; it's Anubis – a clever hack designed to protect servers from the relentless onslaught of AI-powered scrapers.

Anubis is like a digital gatekeeper, tasked with keeping unwanted visitors out of our online domain. This technology uses a Proof-of-Work scheme similar to Hashcash, which adds a layer of computational complexity that makes it more expensive for malicious actors to scrape websites. While this may seem like a small hurdle at an individual level, the cumulative effect on mass scrapers is significant – making their efforts much more difficult and costly.

The true purpose of Anubis lies in its ability to provide a "good enough" placeholder solution, allowing developers time to refine their fingerprinting techniques. This, in turn, enables them to identify legitimate users who may be using headless browsers (think those sneaky AI-powered bots) with greater ease. By doing so, the challenge proof of work page can remain accessible only to those who truly need it – not the malicious actors that are more likely to be masquerading as legitimate users.

However, Anubis has a crucial caveat: it relies on modern JavaScript features that certain plugins like JShelter may disable. If you're reading this from behind such a plugin, please consider disabling it or switching to a compatible alternative. Don't worry; you still need to enable your web browser's JavaScript capabilities to get past the challenge page – as AI-powered scraping has altered the social contract around website hosting in fundamental ways.

This isn't a perfect solution by any means. A true no-JS solution is still an active area of development. Nonetheless, Anubis represents an innovative attempt to maintain online accessibility while thwarting the scourge of AI-powered scrapers. As we continue to navigate this rapidly evolving digital landscape, it's essential to recognize and appreciate such clever technical workarounds.