Did you know that you can replicate the content of an entire website? Well, welcome to web scraping. Web scraping involves data and content extraction from a target website using bots. Unlike screen scraping, which only copies onscreen displays, it extracts the hidden HTML code and stores data within a database. Does this sound interesting? Before you start, you need to know a few crucial things.
Essential Facts You Should Know About Scraping
Understanding the legal confines of scraping, scraper tools and bots, and common myths and misconceptions will set you on the right path. Here is an in-depth look at things you should know before you scrape publicly available data on the internet.
Legal and Ethical Issues Around Scraping
If you are wondering if it is legal to scrape a website, the answer is yes, but there are a few exceptions. Web scraping is permissible if you only go for publicly available data on the internet. However, international regulations may protect certain kinds of data. Scraping them may land you in trouble. On that same note, personal data, confidential information, and secured intellectual property are off limits.
Website owners treat data extraction without permission as malicious. The most common forms of this practice are content and price scraping.
- Content Scraping
Content scraping is simply large-scale content gathering from a specific website without permission. It usually occurs on product catalogs and websites that drive business using digital content. Entire database contents can be released to the wrong people or sold to competitors. Scraped data can facilitate spam, email fraud, and identity theft, among many other things. It can cripple business operations.
- Price Scraping
Perpetrators of price scraping often use scraper bots that spy on their competitors to access pricing information. They use it to outmaneuver their rivals and boost sales, especially in industries with easily comparable products. While perpetrators may enjoy success, scraped business sites may lose customers and revenue to this practice.
What Are Web Scraper Tools?
Web scraping tools are software such as bots programmed to sieve through databases to extract information. You can customize scraper tools to recognize unique HTML structures, pull out and modify content from scraped sites and store the data.
All bots work the same way. It makes it difficult to distinguish between legitimate and malicious ones. However, on scrutiny, certain distinct features can help you differentiate between the two.
- Legitimate bots identify with the organization they scrape. For example, the Googlebot HTTP header identifies it as belonging to Google. On the contrary, malicious bots will create false HTTP user agents to impersonate legitimate traffic.
- Legitimate bots work strictly within permitted access, while hostile scrapers will crawl the website regardless of the owner’s restrictions.
Myths and Misconceptions About Web Scraping
It is cardinal to clear a few fallacies before you start web scraping because of grey areas in operating laws that govern the practice. Some even argue that it is illegal. They maintain that people get away with it because enforcing the law is difficult because of such opaqueness. Others confuse it with hacking or data theft. Here are a few myths you will likely encounter.
- Web Scrapers Exploit Loopholes in the Law
Legitimate web scraping companies obey the same rules and regulations that other enterprises follow when doing business. However, the truth is that the industry is not heavily regulated. This fact, nonetheless, does not give you the license to engage in anything illicit.
- It Is Illegal to Scrape
No rule or law bans web scraping, but it does not mean everything is up for grabs. Ensure you know what you can scrape and how. Look at it this way: you can legally take pictures with your phone but break the law if you snap photographs of a military base or confidential documents.
- Scraping Is a Clever Way of Stealing Data
Web scrapers only collect publicly available data that anyone can access on the internet. They also take note of protected data under copyright and intellectual property.
- Scraping Is the Same as Hacking
This myth is another falsehood you will encounter. It may lead you to a position of moral conflict. Hacking has many interpretations, but the modus operandi uses nonstandard means to access and exploit computer systems and networks. On the contrary, web scrapers similarly access websites like legitimate human users and do not exploit vulnerabilities. They strictly access publicly available data and nothing else.
Final Thoughts
Web scraping is a great way to upscale your online business. It provides concrete data that can help you make informed decisions and stay ahead of the pack. Furthermore, you can do it yourself without hiring experts. You only need to find available scraper tools online at affordable prices. However, there is a fine line between gathering data and the ethics around it, so ensure you’re not causing any damage in the process.