**Protecting Websites from Scrapers: The Reality of Anubis**

As we navigate the digital landscape, it's becoming increasingly clear that website administrators are facing a new challenge in the form of AI-powered scrapers. These intelligent systems are capable of quickly scanning websites for valuable information, often with devastating consequences for websites and their owners. To combat this threat, some administrators have turned to Anubis, a Proof-of-Work scheme designed to make it more expensive and time-consuming for scrapers to access their content.

**How Anubis Works**

Anubis is essentially a digital fingerprinting system that requires users to complete a simple challenge in order to bypass the protection mechanism. This challenge involves solving a math problem that proves a user's capability to run modern JavaScript features, such as those found in web plugins like JShelter. By making this hurdle more difficult for scrapers, Anubis aims to slow down their processes and increase the cost of accessing website content.

**The Downside: Downtime and Accessibility Issues**

While Anubis may seem like a straightforward solution to the problem of AI-powered scraping, it also comes with its own set of drawbacks. One of the most significant is that it can cause downtime for websites, making their resources inaccessible to legitimate users. This is because the additional load required by Anubis can put a strain on servers and websites, leading to slower load times and potential crashes.

**The Catch-22 of Anubis**

Anubis requires the use of modern JavaScript features that plugins like JShelter will disable. In order to access the challenge page, users must enable JavaScript, which can be a problem for those who rely on these plugins for accessibility or security reasons. As a result, websites running Anubis require users to opt-out of certain plugins in order to proceed, creating a catch-22 situation that can leave some users frustrated and unable to access the content they need.

**A Short-Term Solution with Long-Term Consequences**

Anubis is, at its core, a temporary solution designed to buy more time for administrators to develop a more comprehensive and effective solution. The fact remains that AI-powered scraping is on the rise, and websites will need to find ways to adapt in order to stay ahead of this threat. As we move forward, it's essential that website administrators prioritize developing no-JS solutions that can provide an alternative to Anubis for those who cannot or do not want to use JavaScript.

**Conclusion**

The battle between scrapers and website owners is a complex one, with each side constantly evolving and adapting. While Anubis may seem like a simple solution to this problem, it's essential to acknowledge its limitations and the potential consequences it can have on users. As we look to the future, it's crucial that website administrators prioritize developing more comprehensive solutions that balance security, accessibility, and user experience.