#bot scraping

[tinypandacakes]

Attn authors on AO3! Just learned about this on a writing discord I’m in and thought I’d share.

A new website, https://rivd.net/, has cropped up and has been shown to have stolen/scraped works from Ao3, which are being scraped and uploaded at a rather impressive speed.

At this time, it isn't clear if site owners have wised up and have started taking the fics down, as the site requires an account and also the current *justified outrage* at this has led to an apparent overload on the site's servers, meaning they've basically shut down the search and privatized their fanfiction category.

The best way to protect your work if it has not already been scraped is by locking it to all logged out users. It’s unfortunate as guest comments and kudos are so precious to us authors, but it will protect your works from being scraped.

Further information can be found in this Reddit thread and the below screenshots: https://www.reddit.com/r/AO3/comments/1dvyvqm/ao3_fics_being_uploaded_to_rivd_by_a_bot/

NOTE: DO NOT USE RIVD's DMCA TAKEDOWN FORM. You SHOULD NOT be required to provide your *government ID* to protect your intellectual property. This is borderline a phishing scam. RIVD is hosted by Cloudflare, who have a system for reporting abuse on sites which use their services which can be found at the following site: https://www.cloudflare.com/trust-hub/reporting-abuse/.

Thank you @punemy-spotted for compiling all this info and helping get the word out.

[altschmerzes]

every day i see 500 posts about archive-locking fics to protect from bot scraping and every day i just want to bang my head into the wall over and over because

1. It Has Already Been Scraped, the damage is done.

2. archive-locking fics is only a Good Solid Protective Measure against bot scraping if you believe that people who have the ability to create and shape this kind of technology cannot make some fairly minor adjustments to access archive-locked fics. it would not be hard. that’s like saying ‘i’m worried about getting stabbed so i have put on a lace-woven cardigan.’

3. ao3 did not “recommend that everyone do this” as i’ve seen about 400 of those 500 posts say. they, in the post where they confirmed scraping had taken place, said that if people wanted to do something that was an option for something they could do if they felt like it. hardly an urged warning that everyone really should take this as an important safety and security measure.

4. the only people this is deterring are people who don’t browse logged in or don’t have an account. literally all you’re doing is making your fic harder to access for people who actually want to like....... read it. it’s security theatre at best and maybe this is a very small hill to die on but i’m very tired of seeing dozens of posts urging everyone to do this Right Now because it’s Critical to protecting your fics from ai bot scraping. that’s just......... can we think about this for a second.

[ginnyw-potter-archive]

hey there! I was on Ao3 and couldn’t give any of your work. Do you know what happened???

Hi!

Yes, they are now visible to registered users only. If you log on you'll be able to see it and they'll all have a lock beside it. They're still there!

I didn't want to do this, and I thought about it for a long time, but I wanted to protect my fics from any type of bot scraping, and at least this puts up a little bit of a barrier (though not completely unfortunately).

I don't want to train AI with my writing but I was reluctant to do this still because I know that means some people will not be able to access the fic because of that. And now there was another website called Rivd that was scraping fics off AO3 and reposting them to their website (luckily it looks like that one is offline already) and that was the tipping point for me. I've had fics reposted to Instagram before and couldn't do anything about it (they're still up!). A lot of times these requests involve giving your legal name and details to someone for a take-down request. Websites like Rivd are not going to care.

So do log on if you have an account. If you absolutely for some reason cannot make an account and log on, just message me on here or discord and I'll happily send you a link to a Google doc. I'm not trying to keep humans out, just the bots.

TLDR: they're now for registered users only because of bot scraping and fic stealing

[winters-chills]

Hey fellow writers, serious time!

Huge thanks to @korblez for notifying me as I'm no longer on twitter!

If you write or have ever written fanfic then it's worth going over to Plush Books on Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0BMB1RG5J/about - and checking to see if one of your titles is there. At the moment, it looks like in excess of 500 written pieces have been scraped from Archive of Our Own and are being sold in ebook format, without the writers knowledge or consent.

Twitter thread detailing the issue and how you can file DMCA takedown requests if you do spot one of your works there:

If you have an account on AO3, LOCK IT DOWN. Only allowed verified users to read it, people with genuine accounts. Does this suck for people who don't have an account? Sure, but it's not hard to get one. Lock your account down to prevent this from happening. Put an authors note (just like back in the old LJ days eyyy) at the top of your fic stating you do not consent for it to be sold as an ebook.

And writers? I've seen an upsetting number of you saying you don't see what the big deal is about the AI artwork surge that's happening. Do you get it now?

Stand with visual artists. Say NO to AI!

[popcornfairy28]

Hey I've locked my fics for now

Due to concerns about RIVD, an AI company scraping AO3 right now, I've decided to lock my fics for only registered users. Currently, I'm keeping up my podfics for guests though, since the majority of those are of other people's works and I don't think they can scrape those as easily??? That may change though. I also have a few of my fics on fanfiction.net, which I can't lock there so 🤷‍♀️ I guess you can read them there if you're a guest.

I will probably eventually unlock my fics when this blows over, which should be a matter of weeks. But in the meantime it is also pretty easy to get an AO3 account, so I would encourage you to get that if you haven't already. I love all my guest readers, so just hang in there.

[lindaghill]

One-Liner Wednesday - I hates the bots

It’s official—I’m having my 3rd-best year of all time already … and I’m not happy about it. Photo: Screenshot of my “Insights” stats for 2026 with 2025 for comparison. My realistic month of January last year had 6.9K views on my blog. This year the bots exploded the number to 59K. If you would like to participate in this prompt, feel free to use the “One-Liner Wednesday” title in your post, and…

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[isalisewrites]

Shaking my head.

Cute, but we have enough AI reading our shit as it is.

It does not bring me a smile to know that a bot read my fic and found a haiku. If a user found a haiku and told me, that would give me a smile.

I don't write for bots. I write for people.

[gairid]

Ebook-Tree.com Bot Scraping Debacle

If you are a ficwriter and you’ve posted anything on AO3 (among other places), you might want to check this out. To see if your fic has been scraped and thrown onto this  site, go to ebook-tree.com and enter your name into the search bar. If so, you might want to inform these Kings of Idiot Douchebaggery to take your work down. There is information on the Metanews Journal in Dreamwidth

 http://metanews.dreamwidth.org/

As a result, for now I have tagged all my fic aside from the 4 that were scraped to be available to AO3 users only at this time. AO3 advises this as a way to prevent more bot-scraping, though it’s not fool-proof.