What is NetcraftSurveyAgent?
NetcraftSurveyAgent is operated by Netcraft, a cybersecurity company specializing in threat intelligence and digital risk protection. The bot crawls websites to build threat intelligence databases that detect phishing sites and online threats, powering brand protection services that protect organizations from fraud and scams. You can set up Agent Analytics to see when NetcraftSurveyAgent visits your website.
Category
| Example User Agent | Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; NetcraftSurveyAgent/1.0; +info@netcraft.com) |
| Operated By | Netcraft |
| Source | Official Website |
| Triggered By | Operator-configured crawl |
| Used for AI Model Training | Possibly |
| Affects AI Chat & Search Visibility | Not directly |
| Expected To Follow Robots.txt | Yes |
Why Is NetcraftSurveyAgent Visiting My Website?
Netcraft or one of its clients may be gathering competitive intelligence, measuring advertisements, or evaluating content for brand safety. The pages requested reflect the underlying objective.
Should I Block NetcraftSurveyAgent?
Confirm NetcraftSurveyAgent's purpose before blocking it. Intelligence gatherers may collect competitive research, measure advertisements, or evaluate pages for brand safety. Weigh any benefit against sharing business or page-level data with its operator or clients. For context, 7% of the top websites we track currently have robots.txt rules for NetcraftSurveyAgent.
How Do I Block NetcraftSurveyAgent Using Robots.txt?
Add this rule to your robots.txt file to block NetcraftSurveyAgent from accessing your website, or use Automatic Robots.txt to block all intelligence gatherers at once. You can customize which pages are blocked by swapping out / for a different path.
User-agent: NetcraftSurveyAgent # https://knownagents.com/agents/netcraftsurveyagent
Disallow: /Insights for NetcraftSurveyAgent
As of October 29, 2026, this data reflects agent visits measured across thousands of websites using Agent Analytics, combined with daily scans of the top 1000 websites and their robots.txt files.
Robots.txt Compliance
Country of Origin
Robots.txt Blocked Percentage
Frequently Asked Questions
What Traffic Patterns Should I Expect From NetcraftSurveyAgent?
NetcraftSurveyAgent's traffic pattern depends on the intelligence being collected. It may revisit specific pages on a schedule, crawl broader sections of your site, or appear only when information is requested. Its request scope and frequency reflect the underlying objective.
Does NetcraftSurveyAgent Follow Robots.txt Rules?
NetcraftSurveyAgent is expected to follow robots.txt rules, so a disallow rule is the appropriate first step if you want to block it. Automatic Robots.txt can add and maintain that rule, while Agent Analytics lets you verify whether NetcraftSurveyAgent respects it.
Is NetcraftSurveyAgent Used for AI Model Training?
Possibly, but its category does not establish that purpose. NetcraftSurveyAgent's operator may use or provide the collected content for AI training or for unrelated automated tasks.
Does Blocking NetcraftSurveyAgent Affect AI Search or Citations?
Not directly. NetcraftSurveyAgent's expected purpose is not to supply an AI search index or retrieve pages for AI-generated answers.
Does NetcraftSurveyAgent Access Private Content?
No special access. NetcraftSurveyAgent can read publicly available pages but cannot bypass authentication. Assume anything you publish openly may be collected.
How Can I Verify a Request From NetcraftSurveyAgent?
Agent Analytics tracks NetcraftSurveyAgent visits in real time. You can also check your server logs for requests whose user-agent string contains "NetcraftSurveyAgent". Traffic may range from repeated requests to the same pages to broader crawls or one-off fetches. Because NetcraftSurveyAgent does not publish a verification method, any client can claim its identity and a log match is only a clue.
How Is NetcraftSurveyAgent Different From Other Netcraft Agents?
Netcraft operates separate agents for different purposes, so each agent should be evaluated and controlled independently.
- Netcraft: Netcraft is a web crawler that conducts comprehensive internet surveys, analyzing web server technologies and infrastructure across millions of websites to provide market…
- Netcraft SSL Server Survey: Netcraft SSL Server Survey is a security scanner operated by Netcraft, a cybersecurity and digital risk protection company. This bot scans websites to collect SSL/TLS cer…