Overview
JavaScript is Qatar's most common secondary barrier
| Value | |
|---|---|
| WAF | 92.6% |
| Antibot | 21.4% |
| CAPTCHA | 20.4% |
| JavaScript | 41.8% |
| Rate Limiting | 12.5% |
| TLS | 18.1% |
WAF is deployed by 92.6% of Qatar sites. JavaScript leads secondary barriers at 41.8%. Antibot (21.4%) outranks CAPTCHA (20.4%). TLS stands at 18.1% and Rate Limiting at 12.5% — the lowest secondary barrier rate.
Barrier Landscape
Antibot edges CAPTCHA among secondary barriers
| Value | |
|---|---|
| WAF | 92.6% |
| Antibot | 21.4% |
| CAPTCHA | 20.4% |
| JavaScript | 41.8% |
| Rate Limiting | 12.5% |
| TLS | 18.1% |
| Has robots.txt | 79.4% |
| Blocks AI crawlers | 14% |
WAF leads at 92.6%. JavaScript is the top secondary at 41.8%. Antibot (21.4%) just exceeds CAPTCHA (20.4%). TLS stands at 18.1%, with Rate Limiting the least-deployed secondary at 12.5%.
Single-barrier sites are Qatar's most common configuration
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| 0 barriers | 4.8% |
| 1 barrier | 31.2% |
| 2 barriers | 34% |
| 3 barriers | 17% |
| 4 barriers | 8.7% |
| 5 barriers | 3.9% |
| 6 barriers | 0.4% |
34.0% of Qatar sites carry exactly two barriers — the most frequent count. Single-barrier sites account for 31.2%, a high share among the group. Sites with three or more barriers represent 30.0%, and 4.8% have no barriers at all.
Most Qatar sites are Easy to access
| Mean recommended tier | |
|---|---|
| All sites | 1.7 |
The browser-based median recommended tier is 2 and the mean is 1.70. Tier 1 and Tier 2 together cover 87.0% of sites. Tier 3 accounts for 9.8%, with fewer than one in thirty sites requiring Tier 4 or above.
Nearly nine in ten sites are Simple or Easy to access
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| 1 - Simple | 47.2% |
| 2 - Easy | 39.8% |
| 3 - Moderate | 9.8% |
| 4 - Complex | 2.3% |
| 5 - Advanced | 0.9% |
47.2% of sites are Tier 1 (Simple) and 39.8% are Tier 2 (Easy). Tier 3 covers 9.8% of sites. Tier 4 accounts for 2.3% and Tier 5 for 0.9% — the small tail requiring the most advanced extraction.
robots.txt
AI crawlers and commercial scrapers are both prominently named in robots.txt
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| AI crawlers | 16% |
| SEO / search indexing | 12.9% |
| SEO audit tools | 13.2% |
| Commercial scrapers | 8.9% |
| Social / content scrapers | 6.2% |
| Archive / research crawlers | 4.7% |
| Monitoring / uptime bots | 0.5% |
16.0% of all 1,092 Qatar domains name an AI crawler in robots.txt — the most of any category. SEO audit tools follow at 13.2% and SEO/search indexing bots at 12.9%. Commercial scrapers are named by 8.9% — a high rate for that category.
Uniform per-agent rules lead the robots.txt posture distribution
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Uniform per-agent rules (no path mixing) | 41.4% |
| Path-level mixed rules for same agent | 32.6% |
| Allow-only (no disallow rules) | 2.6% |
| Mixed AI posture (block some, allow others) | 2.5% |
| Blanket Disallow: / | 2.7% |
41.4% of all Qatar sites use uniform per-agent rules with no path mixing. A further 32.6% apply path-level mixed rules. 20.6% publish no robots.txt. Blanket Disallow: / covers 2.7% and allow-only posture 2.6% of sites.
GPTBot faces the most Disallow rules in Qatar's robots.txt
| Disallowed | Allowed (whitelisted) | |
|---|---|---|
| GPTBot | 11.8% | 2.5% |
| CCBot | 8.9% | 0.9% |
| ClaudeBot | 8.5% | 1.4% |
| Google-Extended | 8.5% | 1.5% |
| Bytespider | 7.3% | 0.3% |
| meta-externalagent | 3.4% | 0.4% |
| ChatGPT-User | 6% | 2.7% |
| PerplexityBot | 6% | 2.5% |
| Applebot-Extended | 5.3% | 0.4% |
| OAI-SearchBot | 4.2% | 1.9% |
| anthropic-ai | 5.6% | 0.8% |
11.8% of all Qatar sites name GPTBot in a Disallow rule — the highest rate across all five countries in this group. CCBot follows at 8.9%. ClaudeBot and Google-Extended are tied at 8.5%. ChatGPT-User leads explicit allows at 2.7%.
Seven sectors have every site naming at least one bot to restrict
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Computer & Video Games | 100% |
| Consumer Electronics | 100% |
| Design | 100% |
| Entertainment | 100% |
| Printing | 100% |
| Retail | 100% |
| Textiles & Nonwovens | 100% |
| Adult | 90% |
| Civil Engineering | 90% |
| Comics & Animation | 90% |
| Events | 90% |
| General | 90% |
| Healthcare | 90% |
| Machinery | 90% |
| Mass Media | 90% |
Computer & Video Games, Consumer Electronics, Design, Entertainment, Printing, Retail, and Textiles & Nonwovens all reach 100% — every site names at least one bot in a Disallow rule. Eight further sectors reach 90%, including Events and Healthcare.
Airlines leads explicit bot Allow rules
| % of sites | |
|---|---|
| Airlines | 90% |
| Retail | 80% |
| Photography | 70% |
| Publishing | 70% |
| Science | 70% |
| Sporting Goods | 70% |
| Telecom | 70% |
| Travel & Tourism | 70% |
| Veterinary | 70% |
| Nanotechnology | 66.7% |
| Architecture | 60% |
| Graphic Design | 60% |
| Pharmaceuticals | 60% |
| Real Estate | 60% |
| Software & Dev | 60% |
90% of Qatar Airlines sites name at least one bot in an explicit Allow rule. Retail follows at 80%. Photography, Publishing, Science, Sporting Goods, Telecom, Travel & Tourism, and Veterinary each reach 70%, giving Qatar the broadest top-tier allowlisting.
Industry Patterns
Jewellery & Luxury is the hardest sector to access programmatically
| WAF | Antibot | CAPTCHA | JavaScript | Rate Limit | TLS | robots.txt | Blocks AI | Tier | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jewellery & Luxury | 100% | 10% | 10% | 40% | 40% | 40% | 70% | 0% | Tier 3 |
| Furniture | 90% | 40% | 0% | 40% | 20% | 50% | 60% | 10% | Tier 3 |
| Real Estate | 100% | 20% | 20% | 70% | 50% | 10% | 60% | 40% | Tier 3 |
| Equipment & Supplies | 90% | 50% | 20% | 60% | 30% | 10% | 70% | 10% | Tier 3 |
| Hospitality | 90% | 20% | 0% | 60% | 20% | 40% | 60% | 20% | Tier 3 |
| Medical Devices | 100% | 20% | 0% | 40% | 20% | 0% | 90% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Retail | 100% | 10% | 0% | 70% | 10% | 10% | 100% | 50% | Tier 2 |
| Apparel & Fashion | 90% | 20% | 30% | 60% | 20% | 30% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Human Resources | 100% | 80% | 60% | 50% | 40% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Beauty & Cosmetics | 80% | 30% | 20% | 30% | 40% | 40% | 80% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Computer Hardware | 90% | 20% | 0% | 30% | 20% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Insurance | 80% | 40% | 20% | 30% | 20% | 10% | 70% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Automotive | 100% | 30% | 0% | 40% | 50% | 30% | 70% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Consumer Electronics | 80% | 10% | 10% | 50% | 10% | 50% | 100% | 20% | Tier 2 |
| Public Safety | 100% | 30% | 40% | 70% | 20% | 50% | 90% | 10% | Tier 2 |
Jewellery & Luxury has the highest mean recommended tier at 2.90, with 40% Rate Limiting and TLS each. Furniture follows at 2.70 — with 50% TLS deployment. Real Estate ranks third at 2.60, with 50% Rate Limiting among its secondary barriers.
Adult, Customer Services, and Manufacturing are the most accessible sectors
| WAF | Antibot | CAPTCHA | JavaScript | Rate Limit | TLS | robots.txt | Blocks AI | Tier | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Restaurants | 90% | 40% | 30% | 60% | 30% | 10% | 60% | 20% | Tier 2 |
| Sporting Goods | 90% | 10% | 20% | 50% | 30% | 40% | 70% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Textiles & Nonwovens | 100% | 10% | 60% | 50% | 0% | 10% | 100% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Wholesalers | 80% | 10% | 30% | 50% | 30% | 30% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Food & Beverages | 100% | 50% | 30% | 40% | 30% | 0% | 80% | 20% | Tier 2 |
| Banking | 100% | 30% | 10% | 30% | 10% | 10% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Design | 100% | 20% | 30% | 40% | 20% | 30% | 100% | 30% | Tier 2 |
| Mail & Delivery | 70% | 40% | 10% | 10% | 0% | 20% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| Recruitment & Staffing | 100% | 50% | 60% | 20% | 10% | 30% | 70% | 20% | Tier 2 |
| Transport & Logistics | 70% | 40% | 10% | 10% | 0% | 20% | 80% | 0% | Tier 2 |
| TV & Film | 100% | 50% | 20% | 70% | 40% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Visual Art | 100% | 20% | 30% | 30% | 0% | 10% | 100% | 20% | Tier 2 |
| Adult | 100% | 40% | 30% | 80% | 10% | 20% | 90% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Customer Services | 100% | 10% | 20% | 40% | 20% | 20% | 70% | 10% | Tier 2 |
| Manufacturing | 80% | 10% | 10% | 30% | 0% | 40% | 70% | 0% | Tier 2 |
Adult, Customer Services, and Manufacturing each record the lowest mean tier at 1.90. Twelve sectors above share means of 2.00 to 2.10. Textiles & Nonwovens sits at 2.10 despite 60% CAPTCHA — the highest CAPTCHA rate among all Qatar bottom-tier sectors.