News: 0180735298

  ARM Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)

Automattic and the Internet Archive Team Up To Fight Link Rot

(Thursday February 05, 2026 @04:30PM (msmash) from the whack-a-mole-no-more dept.)


Automattic and the Internet Archive have released a free, open-source WordPress [1]plugin that automatically detects broken outbound links on a site and [2]redirects visitors to archived Wayback Machine copies instead of serving them a 404 error.

The Internet Archive Wayback Machine Link Fixer, which launched last fall and is available on WordPress.org, runs in the background scanning posts for dead links, checking for existing archived versions, and requesting new snapshots when none exist. It also archives a site's own posts whenever they are updated. If the original link comes back online, the plugin stops redirecting.

Pew Research has found that 38% of the web has disappeared over the past decade, and WordPress powers more than 40% of websites online.



[1] https://wordpress.org/plugins/internet-archive-wayback-machine-link-fixer/

[2] https://blog.archive.org/2026/02/04/inside-the-new-wayback-machine-plugin-for-wordpress/


what about the false linking? (Score:1)

by iluvcrap2000 ( 9417277 )

Seen several times that Internet archive has been used as a source for false linking. Seems like they need a overhaul of their security measures. links to it are used to redirect to other sites that are quesitonable.

seems risky (Score:2)

by bugs2squash ( 1132591 )

If a user percieves the archive to be current material it may lead to confusion. Better the 404 error perhaps sometimes

been thinking of doing this for drupal (Score:3)

by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

I used to use weblinks module that did this but it fell out of favor. Now it makes more sense just to scan contents for dead links.

Re: (Score:2)

by CrankyFool ( 680025 )

When you refer to "my cash register," you mean The Internet Archive? Is that right?

Re: What a Great Idea! (Score:2)

by drinkypoo ( 153816 )

Tell your lawyer to suck MY dick.

Why do I need a plugin for that? (Score:2)

by gweihir ( 88907 )

This happens rarely enough that a) being aware is valuable and b) doing it manually is really not a problem.

Re: (Score:3)

by Aristos Mazer ( 181252 )

This plugin is on the server side, not the client side. It's so that wordpress authors can proof their sites against pulled content.

So Richard and I decided to try to catch [the small shark].
With a great deal of strategy and effort and shouting, we managed to
maneuver the shark, over the course of about a half-hour, to a sort of
corner of the lagoon, so that it had no way to escape other than to
flop up onto the land and evolve. Richard and I were inching toward
it, sort of crouched over, when all of a sudden it turned around and --
I can still remember the sensation I felt at that moment, primarily in
the armpit area -- headed right straight toward us.
Many people would have panicked at this point. But Richard and
I were not "many people." We were experienced waders, and we kept our
heads. We did exactly what the textbook says you should do when you're
unarmed and a shark that is nearly two feet long turns on you in water
up to your lower calves: We sprinted I would say 600 yards in the
opposite direction, using a sprinting style such that the bottoms of
our feet never once went below the surface of the water. We ran all
the way to the far shore, and if we had been in a Warner Brothers
cartoon we would have run right INTO the beach, and you would have seen
these two mounds of sand racing across the island until they bonked
into trees and coconuts fell onto their heads.
-- Dave Barry, "The Wonders of Sharks on TV"