Evidence record 18734 · automatically gathered

Is Misinformation More Open? A Study of robots.txt Gatekeeping on the Web

arXiv:2510.10315v4 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) are increasingly relying on web crawling to stay up to date and accurately answer user queries. These crawlers are expected to honor robots.txt files, which govern automated access. In this study, for the first time, we investigate whether reputable news websites and misinformation sites differ in how they configure these files, particularly in relation to AI crawlers. Analyzing a curated dataset, we find a stark co

Record details

Published: 13 August 2026
Source: arXiv cs.CY
Category: Research
Topics: Misinformation · Agents & autonomy · Finance, VC & PE
Retrieved: 13 August 2026

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ethics.ai (13 August 2026), “Is Misinformation More Open? A Study of robots.txt Gatekeeping on the Web,” evidence record 18734, https://ethics.ai/record/18734 (originally published by arXiv cs.CY).

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