Identification
Its full user-agent string, exactly as it arrives at the gate:
Anthropic does not publish a way to verify ClaudeBot's traffic. Treat its user agent as a claim, not proof: anyone can send it.
How to block ClaudeBot
Add these two lines to the robots.txt file at the root of your site. Well-behaved crawlers read it before they crawl, so the change applies from ClaudeBot's next visit. Nothing else on your site needs to change.
# Block ClaudeBot from the whole site User-agent: ClaudeBot Disallow: /
Anthropic also runs Claude-SearchBot (search) and Claude-User (user requests). Each has its own token.
Or let it visit but keep it away from part of the site:
# Let it in, but keep it out of one room User-agent: ClaudeBot Allow: / Disallow: /members/
Observed behaviour
Most active around 18:00. After dark, like a burglar.
Requested 0 disallowed pages out of 28 requests. Read robots.txt 4 times.
Has never followed the hidden link to /trap/. Either well trained or very lucky.
Where it comes from
The networks ClaudeBot's visits came from:
Networks and countries come from the visitor's IP address, looked up in a local copy of the DB-IP database. The addresses themselves are never stored.
Keeper's field notes
Questions site owners ask
Does ClaudeBot respect robots.txt?
Yes. In 28 requests observed here it has read robots.txt and never fetched a disallowed page.
Will blocking ClaudeBot hurt my search rankings?
No. ClaudeBot isn't used by Google or Bing to rank pages. Blocking it only affects whether Anthropic collects your content.
How often does ClaudeBot visit?
Here, about 4 requests a day over the last week. Visits to your site depend on its size, how often it changes, and how many links point to it.