Multiple file download

Hi,

However when I add a multiple-file zip to the download URL field the file’s getting flagged in Google Search Console as a security issue.

How many files are zipped in the one folder? How big is the zipped folder? Is that the complete error message you see in Google search console? Have you tested this action with other browsers like Firefox, Ms Edge, etc.

Regards

The message:

Some or all of the downloads on this site shows “uncommon download” warnings.

The message links to this page: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/3258249?hl=en
And a warning is shown when users try to download the file.

This is an error reported in Search Console so using different browsers won’t fix that file flagging. The usual trick is to simply report the file as “fixed” whereupon Google will mark it as safe. However while we wait for this process to complete with every single zip file they’re inaccessible. If we could just link to several files at once in a product rather than having to put them in a zip which raises suspicions, life would be much easier.

Hi, just one question that I forgot to ask you above. Are you selling digital goods?

Yes

ZIP contained one text file and two folders each containing 5 OTF, 5 WOFF and 5 WOFF2 files. About 2mb total.

If you are selling digital goods, then the following addon protecting-your-digital-downloads-using-the-secure-downloads-addon might help you further. If you require information or support regarding this addon please use the following support forum.

Thank you

I’ve just tested and it seems that Chrome flags even safe .zip files as “possibly malware”. It doesn’t mark exact same file when downloading from Google font storage though – https://google-webfonts-helper.herokuapp.com/fonts/roboto?subsets=latin

However, when I tested it with Secure Download addons, the download went through just fine.

We will discuss this with the team and try to find a workaround for this issue.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by Alexander C..

Looks like I was wrong – downloading of the same file via Secure Downloads doesn’t resolve the issue.

It seems that programming solution is not possible in this situation. The only thing you can do about it is to handle it with Google using the link you provided.

Regarding multiple file downloads – please provide a use case scenario. It looks like you’re selling fonts. So you wanna provide your customers with links to separate files – e.g. 5 links for OTF, 5 links for WOFF and 5 links to WOFF2 files? That doesn’t sound too comfortable from my point of view, single .zip file is much better in this case.

Thanks for discussing it with your devs.

Google’s now marked my zip as safe, but the process involved in getting the approval won’t be so straightforward for some users not familiar or set up with Google Search Console. Not to mention the delay (eyeroll in Google’s direction).

Multiple file download shouldn’t be too much of a problem for customers as most users will only download a few, e.g won’t need both WOFF and WOFF2.

Google’s now marked my zip as safe, but the process involved in getting the approval won’t be so straightforward for some users not familiar or set up with Google Search Console. Not to mention the delay (eyeroll in Google’s direction).

We will provide instructions for that. Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can do about it, as you can understand.

Multiple file download shouldn’t be too much of a problem for customers as most users will only download a few, e.g won’t need both WOFF and WOFF2.

I have created a ticket in our inner system with your use case scenario example. We will discuss adding multiple file download options either to core plugin or to Secure Downloads addon.

Last, but not least – THANK YOU for bringing this matter to us. There are many real life use-case scenarios which we can’t think of, so the more there are, the better in general, since our plugin is mostly users-driven.

Some type of files (even when they are inside a zip file) will get marked like that by Google. That is just how google tries to be safe with user’s downloading zip files that contains certain file types. It is not an issue with this plugin unfortunately.

You may want to package those files inside a .rar file (something the browser is not going to try and read inside).