# Google-Agent in the log and a signature that is not always there | Illia BizTech

> Only some of this agent

Source: https://illia-biztech.de/en/forum/im-log-steht-google-agent-und-unsere-firewall-lasst-ihn-nur-mit-signatur-durch

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# Google-Agent turned up in the log and our firewall admits it only when signed

Some of these requests carry a signature, some do not, and the unsigned ones are refused.

* ##### Asked by  
QuietAnchor208
* ##### Asked on  
September 18, 2026

Since late summer 2026 our log has carried a request named Google-Agent. Our contractor built a rule that admits such requests only with a valid cryptographic signature.

Since then we see refused requests under the same name. It looks as though part of the traffic arrives unsigned.

#### Answers

![Portrait of Illia Belichenko, technical specialist at Illia BizTech](/_ipx/f_webp,q_75/https://cms.illia-biztech.de/uploads/small_Illia_Belichenko_author_81f88864f0.png)

##### Illia Belichenko · Founder & Technical Lead

✓ Accepted answer September 19, 2026 

Your observation matches what Google writes about the scheme. Only a subset of this agent's requests is signed. A rule that trusts the signature alone refuses the remainder, and both halves come from the same sender.

Google recommends continuing to rely on IP addresses, reverse DNS and user agent strings while signing is rolled out gradually. Building a firewall rule on that is a bet on a moving target.

A second point concerns robots.txt. Google files Google-Agent among user-triggered fetches, and about that whole class its documentation says the rules in robots.txt are generally disregarded. Anyone hoping to govern these requests through the file is governing nothing there.

Build the rule in two stages. An address check against the published ranges comes first, and the signature is an additional signal on top of it. Check your protection provider's defaults as well. Cloudflare, for one, applies new defaults from 15 September 2026, and they cover domains onboarded from that date onwards. Somebody has to hold that watch, and where nobody in the company does, [Illia BizTech](https://illia-biztech.de/en/) holds it.

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**Topics** 
* Agents
* Firewall

Google documents an agent that acts on a person's behalf and files it among user-triggered fetches. About that whole class the documentation records that robots.txt rules are generally disregarded.

Only part of this agent's traffic is signed, which is why Google recommends checking addresses alongside it for now. A site therefore meets requests from a single source that look different from one another. An address range check carries further here than the signature by itself.