You can ban visitors so that they can't access the Chat widget or Web Widget (Classic) and chat with agents. Visitors can be added to the banned visitor list directly from a chat, or from the Chat dashboard. You can view, search, and add users to the Banned Visitors list through the Banned settings page.
This article contains the following topics:
Banning visitors
You can ban unlimited visitors, and up to 5,000 IP addresses. If the number of banned IP addresses exceeds 5,000, the oldest banned IP address is removed from the list and is no longer banned.
There are two ways to ban a visitor:
- Directly from a chat: With this option, the system places a cookie on the
visitor's browser to identify
them.
This method prevents visitors from avoiding the ban with proxies or VPNs, but
they might still be able to get through it on another browser.
After selecting Ban Visitor from the chat, you also have the choice of banning the visitor's IP address at the same time, as described in the steps below.
-
Adding the IP address to the Banned Visitors list: This option stops banned visitors from gaining access just through another browser, but it also doesn't prevent them from using a proxy or VPN.
To ban a visitor directly from a chat
- From the chat window, select Ban Visitor from the Actions
drop-down menu.
- Optional: Enter a reason in the Reason field.
- Optional: If you want to also ban the visitor's IP address, select the Also ban visitor's IP address check box.
- Click Ban User.
To ban a visitor by IP address
- From the dashboard, select Settings > Banned.
- To add a visitor's IP to the list, click Add Visitor.
- Enter an IP address and a reason.
- Click Create Ban.
Viewing and managing banned visitors
Banned visitors are listed on the Banned settings page.
On the Banned settings page you can:
- View all banned visitors
- Search the banned visitors list
- Add visitors to the banned list by IP address (described in the previous section)
- Remove visitors from the banned list
By default, the banned visitors list displays 10,000 entries (5,000 each for visitors and IP addresses). Using the Chat API, you can extend this to display up to 5,000 banned IP addresses and unlimited banned visitors. See Bans in our developer documentation.
To access the Banned settings page and view banned visitors
- From the dashboard, select Settings > Banned.
A list of all banned visitors is displayed. The list includes the following columns:
- Visitor/IP address, the name of the banned user or banned IP address
- Reason, the description given for banning the user/IP address
- Date created, the date the user/IP address was banned
You can display only banned IP addresses, or only banned individual visitors, by using the Filter drop-down menu at the top of the page.
To search the banned visitors list
- Go to the Banned settings page.
- In the Search box, enter one or more keywords to search for.
- As you type, the list displays only banned IP addresses or visitors with the search terms in their name, IP address, or reason for banning.
To remove a visitor from the ban list
- From the Banned settings page, select the check box next to the visitor's name or IP address.
- Click the Delete Selected button that appears at the top of the list.
- Click Delete on the window that appears.
The end user experience
- If you have an embedded Chat standalone widget, the widget will not load for that visitor on your website.
- If you are using a messaging Web Widget or Mobile SDK, a chat connection will not be established.
- If you are using Chat in the Web Widget (Classic), the Web Widget (Classic) will still appear to the visitor, but the chat option will not appear in the contact options menu.
17 comments
USER-0123456789
I have the same issue as Sara above.
I cannot find the Ban Visitor option in the our workspace in an active chat. Has this functionality been removed?
To be clear, I am looking for the ability to ban a user during a chat interaction, not email.
Thanks!
1
Jay Clementson
Hello,
Why hasn't the ability to ban an email from ZD Chat been established yet? Right now, we have a person trolling us and they continue to change the IP address but, they will use the same email address.
What can be done?
1
Neil
Hi,
For Support accounts that are on Agent Workspace, the ban visitor feature is not supported as mentioned in the Dashboard Limitation
If the Zendesk widget is nested in your Guide help center, you may opt to restrict the help center access to signed-in end-users and suspend those users that are sending spam messages.
If it is placed on an external site, you can apply the same concept as above, require the users to login before making the widget visible.
As for the option to ban visitors using via email address, no recent news of it's development yet.
-3
Rudolph
@... - Why is such a basic feature like banning a visitor in chat not yet implemented? Folks have been requesting this for over a year, and the fact that a single angry user can troll a company infinitely is absurd.
Zendesk really needs to get this basic feature implemented if Agent Workspaces is going to be taken seriously.
2
Jay Clementson
Hey,
Are any changes going to made to this topic?
2 years ago: Specific to visitor banning, there is nothing in the roadmap for the next 6 months that would address this feature change.
6 days ago: As for the option to ban visitors using via email address, no recent news of it's development yet.
1
Permanently deleted user
Hi
Is there any possibility that we can add a timeframe for the ban? Like we can choose how long we ban this visitor, or an option to ban the visitor but it will be unbanned automatically after like 7 days
0
Cheeny Aban
Hi Felix,
Unfortunately, there is no native way to set a ban timeframe in Chat yet, but we understand your need for this functionality so I am marking this ticket as product feedback. We truly value customer feedback and your voice and votes in the product feedback topics in the community help influence future Zendesk functionality.
-1
Pooja Palan
Hi Everyone,
Thank you for all of your questions on this post. We love your feedback. If you have more product feedback on this topic, we'd like to hear from you!
Please find some time to talk to our product directly at https://calendly.com/pooja-palan/30min?back=1&month=2021-08
Thanks!
-1
James Green
Am I reading this correctly that if you've migrated your chat tool into the agent workspace, there's no way to ban a customer? .... There's no solution to stop abusive bots/customers?
1
Sydney Neubauer
We just used the steps above and banned the IP of the end-user. As it turns out, there were 9 other chats using the same IP and they were all ended abruptly. There should be a disclaimer that this can happen as it caused a lot of confusion and angry end-users as they were sent back to the queue
2
Seretha Curry
There's a workaround for this. In Support, locate the email address for your user. Assume the user's identity. Start a chat by going to your help desk, etc. When you answer the chat, you will have the opportunity to ban the visitor rather than the IP address. Presto, good bye, bad actor.
3
Dave Dyson
0
CJ Johnson
It would be great if there was a note that despite a Reason being required, it does not get used or recorded anywhere, and functionally does nothing.
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0
Karen C. Early
Thanks for posting! Very cool tip
0
Danielle
Seretha Curry Thanks for this tip! Is this workaround a possibility in Agent Workspace? It sounds like assuming the end user makes the ‘Ban a visitor’ button appear when it normally isn't an option possibly? I'm grateful for any further help/clarification you may have time to offer!
0
Danielle
Zendesk please make it an option to ban a visitor in Agent Workspace - we need this functionality. Banning IP addresses is not sufficient.
1
Shawna James
0