BigScoots has developed a new Block by Country WordPress feature that gives clients self-service control over their Cloudflare Enterprise service options. This feature allows clients to block site traffic requests from countries they choose not to serve.
CHICAGO, IL, UNITED STATES, January 7, 2024–BigScoots, a site-specific, fully managed WordPress hosting provider, announced the introduction of a new Block by Country WordPress feature that gives clients using Cloudflare Enterprise a self-service option to directly choose countries within their BigScoots client portal that they want to block from service.
Blocking by country gives site owners the ability to protect their sites from SPAM, DDoS, or other potentially dangerous traffic they see frequently originating from specific countries.
For publishers or online e-commerce stores, however, this feature gives site owners the power to block unqualified site visits from countries outside their markets. This can help to reduce unnecessary costs associated with the consumption of hosting resources used to serve sites to non-targeted countries, preventing site owners from paying for traffic that they don’t want or cannot use.
Expanding User Controls for Cloudflare Enterprise
The Block by Country feature is not a new feature for hosting clients. However, giving clients the ability to control this feature on their own, within their client portal, means they now quickly make these changes rather than waiting for support responses.
“Block Country requests are one of the most common tickets that our support team encounters. We are always seeking out ways to support clients faster. So, we applied our expertise with Cloudflare’s bleeding edge technologies to build this option into our portal and give clients the option to make these changes on their own, without any wait.”
Saumya Majumder, Lead Software Engineer at BigScoots.
As one the very first hosting companies to adopt Cloudflare hosting for WordPress, BigScoots continues to use its expertise with Cloudflare to develop user features that give clients more control options over their Cloudflare services. This new feature joins a list of other unique self-service controls for Cloudflare Enterprise, including customizable settings, analytics dashboards, and advanced hotlink protection features.
How It Works
This new feature, available to BigScoots clients using Cloudflare Enterprise, can be found within the BigScoots WordPress Optimized (WPO) Client Portal within the Security Settings dashboards, titled “Block Requests from Countries.”
The dashboard offers several robust drop-down options to not only choose blocking by specific countries but also prevent Tor (The Onion Router) traffic and Unknown country traffic. Each selection will block all traffic from specified countries except verified bots. There is a reason for this.
Exception for Verified Bots
Google and other search engines use web crawlers to index sites from all around the world. BigScoots engineers recognized that if a crawler hits a blocked site, it could penalize their search ranking. Therefore, an exception is built into the site-blocking feature that allows verified bots to crawl these sites as usual.
Clear Explanation for Blocked Visitors
Even though a country may be blocked, it is appropriate to be transparent with visitors why and provide them options. Therefore, if someone within the blocked country tries to access your site, they will receive an explanation of why they cannot, with options to request access if an error has been made.
Cloudflare Enterprise Inclusion
BigScoots clients using WordPress speed optimization services with their managed WordPress or managed dedicated plans have access to Cloudflare Enterprise features. Cloudflare Enterprise is also included with Mediavine hosting plans that are exclusively available to Mediavine clients.
If you would like access to these Cloudflare Enterprise features, visit the BigScoots website and start a chat with the BigScoots team about all of the performance and security advantages of adding WordPress speed optimization services.
About BigScoots
BigScoots is a site-specific managed WordPress hosting and performance services provider that can uniquely support scalable enterprise, and WooCommerce needs by owning and operating its own hardware infrastructure. Its always-available live chat and support responses within ~90 seconds have redefined industry support and service expectations. With over 20,000+ customers, over 14 years of 5-star reviews, and consistent Top Quartile Net Promoter Scores (NPS), BigScoots is the best and final choice that organizations will make in choosing a true hosting partner.
