This article does two things: It tells you how to do URL masking. And, it tells you how to protect yourself if someone is masking your web pages without authorization.
URL masking is covering up a URL with a different one. It presents one URL when the actual URL is something different.
Causing the browser’s address bar to show a URL different than the actual URL of the web page being viewed is one definition of URL masking. Another definition is to cause a link URL to show in the browser’s status bar different than the URL of the web page being linked to.
This article addresses the first definition of URL masking. One URL is in the browser’s address bar. The web page being displayed in the browser window is at a different URL.
I will describe several ways to mask URLs. I will also show how to frustrate those who would mask your web page URLs without your consent.
When you know how to accomplish it and how to prevent it, you are that much more in control of your web site.
Here are the three methods of masking URLs addressed by this article:
- With frames.
- With Apache rewrite.
- With page retrieval software.
There are defenses from the first and third method that site owners can employ to prevent that kind of maneuvering. The second method needs no defense because only someone with access to the domain can use it.
URL Masking With Frames
Two different types of frames can be used to present a web page in the browser with a URL different than the URL in the address bar.
- The FRAMESET tag.
- The IFRAME tag.
In both methods, when the web page with the frame is loaded into the browser, the frame web page’s URL is in the browser’s address bar even while the browser window displays a web page located at a different URL.
The frames web page originally loaded into the browser and the web page retrieved from elsewhere may be on different domains.
Using The FRAMESET Tag For URL Masking.
This method hides all visual cues that the web page being displayed is not at the URL in the browser’s address bar (unless the web page being displayed itself contains images or wordage that provide clues).
What you do is create a FRAMESET web page that loads the target web page.
Make a web page with the following code. Change the URL in the third line of the code to the URL of the web page to be displayed in the browser.
Put only the above into the FRAMESET web page. Use no HTML or BODY or other normal web page tags.
Upload the FRAMESET web page to your server. Load the FRAMESET web page into your browser.
You’ll notice that the URL of the FRAMESET web page is in your browser’s address bar even while a different web page, the one you specified in the third line of the above code, is displayed in the browser window.
That’s the simplicity of URL masking with a FRAMESET tag.
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