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Web Bot Auth
also Web Bot Authentication or webbotauth or HTTP Message Signatures for automated traffic
Definition of Web Bot Auth
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: an emerging web authentication protocol and IETF working-group effort that lets automated HTTP clients, including AI agents and crawlers, cryptographically sign requests so a website can verify which operator or product sent them
- The travel site checked the assistant's Web Bot Auth signature before allowing it to read booking pages on the user's behalf.
- Web Bot Auth can prove that a crawler belongs to a known operator, but it does not by itself prove that the end user approved a purchase.
Two meanings, one word
In everyday English
Auth is short for authentication, the process of proving an identity.
In AI
An emerging web authentication protocol and IETF working-group effort that lets automated HTTP clients, including AI agents and crawlers, cryptographically sign requests…
Origin & history
The IETF Web Bot Auth working group is standardizing the approach. Its first working-group protocol draft, draft-ietf-webbotauth-httpsig-protocol-00, was published on 1 September 2026 by authors from Cloudflare and Google and builds on HTTP Message Signatures.
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Cite this entry
"Web Bot Auth." AI Dictionary, Dadgogo, https://dadgogo.com/dictionary/web-bot-auth/. Accessed 7 Oct. 2026.