Documentation | Support

Go to the table of contents Go to the previous page Go to the next page View or print as PDF
Exceptions to Web Protection Policies > What is a referer?
What is a referer?
Administrator Help | Forcepoint Web Security and Forcepoint URL Filtering | v8.5.x
When one website links users to another website, the first website refers the user to the second. Typically, this information is captured in the HTTP referer field in an HTTP header. (The term "HTTP referer" was originally a misspelling, but it has since been adopted into the HTTP specification.)
For secondary elements on a website, like images or advertisements, the referer is typically the HTML page that calls those secondary elements.
When you create exceptions that permit one or more sites, you can either permit those sites regardless of how they are accessed, or permit them only when they are linked from a site that you specify (the referer).
If, for example, you permit example.com only when referred by mycompany.com, users can click the example.com link on the mycompany.com website and get to the page. Secondary elements on the page, however, like images and advertisements, will not appear, because the referer for those elements is example.com.
 
* 
Note 
If the security settings on the client's browsers have referer headers turned off, this feature will not work as expected. Access to the URL can be permitted only if the referer can be confirmed.
Exceptions defined with referer sites are not used by the hybrid service.

Go to the table of contents Go to the previous page Go to the next page View or print as PDF
Exceptions to Web Protection Policies > What is a referer?
Copyright 2023 Forcepoint. All rights reserved.