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How protection works

timeout187 edited this page Jul 9, 2026 · 1 revision

How protection works

The AntiLink scanning pipeline - what gets checked, who is exempt, and how prohibited links are handled.

View this page in the localized AntiLink documentation

Understanding how AntiLink processes a message makes setup, whitelisting, and troubleshooting far easier. Here is what happens to every message.

The scanning pipeline

For each message posted in your server, AntiLink runs these steps in order:

Is the author exempt?

If the author is the server owner, an administrator, a whitelisted user or role, or the message is in a whitelisted / ignored channel or category, AntiLink stops here and does nothing. Exempt authors are never moderated.

Does the message contain a link?

AntiLink looks for URLs and Discord invites in the message text. A message with no links is ignored (file uploads and plain text are not links).

Is that link type blocked?

The link is classified as a Discord invite, an external link, or a known-malicious / phishing URL, and checked against your enabled protections and your whitelist. A whitelisted domain is always allowed.

Score and enforce

The link is risk-scored, then the message is handled according to your enforcement mode (delete, quarantine, or warn), and a moderation log entry is recorded.

Who is never affected

This is the single most important thing to understand, and the most common source of "it isn't working" reports:

Warning

AntiLink always exempts the server owner, anyone with Administrator, Manage Server, or Manage Messages, your whitelisted users and roles, and whitelisted or ignored channels and categories. If you test with your own admin account, nothing will happen - that is by design. Test with a normal member account.

This safety-first exemption applies across every module: link protection, Automod, Scam Guard, and Honeypot channels.

What AntiLink looks at

Signal Used for
Message content Finding links to moderate
Message author + roles Checking exemptions and whitelist
Channel / category Checking whitelisted or ignored locations
Join timestamp (from the message) New-member link lockdown

AntiLink does not store your messages. When a link is removed, it logs the author, channel, reason, and the detected link for your dashboard activity view. See Security & Trust for the full data breakdown.

Enforcement modes

When a prohibited link is found, the enforcement mode decides what happens (configure it with /config or the dashboard Protection tab):

Mode What it does
Delete Removes the offending message and logs it. The default.
Quarantine Removes the message and applies your mute role, holding the user for review.
Warn Logs a warning and escalates repeat offenders.

Warn-mode escalation

In Warn mode, repeat offenders climb a ladder rather than being punished all at once: a warning first, then the mute role, then progressively longer timeouts. Counts reset after 30 days of good behavior.

Link risk levels

The /checklink command and the dashboard rate a URL as clean, low, medium, high, or critical, using offline heuristics plus optional threat-intelligence feeds. "Clean" means no known threat was found at the time of the check - it is never a guarantee of safety.

Info

Ready to configure it? Follow the Setup Guide, then see Best Practices for recommended roles and whitelist strategy.

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