nBlick Signal Agent

Description

Server-side, non-blocking request logging with a local queue, batched delivery,
exponential-backoff retries, a circuit breaker, query-parameter redaction, and
path filtering. Admin actions use the WordPress REST API.

Configuration

Settings -> nBlick Signal Agent. Set the API key (or define NBLICK_SIGNAL_API_KEY
in wp-config.php), enable logging, and use the Status tab to send a test event.

External services

This plugin connects to the nBlick Signal API, a third-party service, to provide
bot detection and traffic analysis. This connection is essential to the plugin’s
purpose: request data collected on your site is transmitted to nBlick for
analysis, and the plugin does nothing useful without it.

What is sent, and when:

  • The plugin sends batches of request metadata to the nBlick Signal ingest
    endpoint (default: https://api.trynblick.com/signals/wordpress) on a recurring
    background schedule (via WP-Cron) whenever logging is enabled and queued data
    exists, and once when you click “Send Test Event”.
  • Each request record may contain: the visitor’s IP address, the request method,
    host, path, HTTP status code, user agent, referer, response size, request
    duration, a timestamp, query-string parameters (with sensitive keys such as
    passwords and tokens redacted), a per-site identifier (UUID), and a schema
    version number.
  • Only public front-end traffic is sent. WordPress admin, login, REST API, AJAX,
    cron, WP-CLI, and any paths you exclude are never collected or transmitted.
  • Authentication uses an API key you provide, sent in the X-NBlick-Signal-Key
    request header.

The IP address is transmitted in full because it is required for the service’s
bot-detection and reverse-DNS analysis.

This service is provided by nBlick. By using the plugin you are sending the data
described above to nBlick. Please review their terms and privacy policy:

  • Terms of service: https://trynblick.com/terms-of-service
  • Privacy policy: https://trynblick.com/privacy-policy

Privacy

  • The plugin is server-side only. It sets no cookies and performs no client-side
    or browser tracking.
  • Sensitive query parameters (configurable; by default password, pass, token,
    auth, authorization, apikey, api_key, secret, card, cc, ssn and similar) are
    redacted to “[REDACTED]” before storage and transmission.
  • Captured data is queued in a local database table and removed after it is sent
    successfully, or purged after the configured retention period (default 7 days).
  • When the Sodium PHP extension is available, the API key is encrypted at rest
    using your site’s authentication salts; defining NBLICK_SIGNAL_API_KEY in
    wp-config.php avoids database storage entirely.
  • Because the plugin transmits visitor IP addresses to a third party, you may
    need to disclose this in your own site’s privacy policy depending on your
    jurisdiction (e.g. GDPR/CCPA).

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Contributors & Developers

“nBlick Signal Agent” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.

Contributors

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Interested in development?

Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.

Changelog

1.0.0

  • Initial release: queue-based capture, batched delivery with exponential-backoff
    retries, circuit breaker, query-parameter redaction, request/path filtering,
    API-key encryption, retention cleanup, and a REST-API-driven admin interface.