puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp

A plugin for puppeteer-extra and playwright-extra to prevent detection.

Install

1yarn add puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp
2# - or -
3npm install puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp

If this is your first puppeteer-extra plugin here's everything you need:

1yarn add puppeteer puppeteer-extra puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp
2# - or -
3npm install puppeteer puppeteer-extra puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp

Usage

1// puppeteer-extra is a drop-in replacement for puppeteer,
2// it augments the installed puppeteer with plugin functionality
3const puppeteer = require('puppeteer-extra')
4
5// add stealth plugin and use defaults (all evasion techniques)
6const StealthPlugin = require('puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp')
7puppeteer.use(StealthPlugin())
8
9// puppeteer usage as normal
10puppeteer.launch({ headless: true }).then(async browser => {
11  console.log('Running tests..')
12  const page = await browser.newPage()
13  await page.goto('https://bot.sannysoft.com')
14  await page.waitForTimeout(5000)
15  await page.screenshot({ path: 'testresult.png', fullPage: true })
16  await browser.close()
17  console.log(`All done, check the screenshot. ✨`)
18})

1import puppeteer from 'puppeteer-extra'
2import StealthPlugin from 'puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp'
3
4puppeteer
5  .use(StealthPlugin())
6  .launch({ headless: true })
7  .then(async browser => {
8    const page = await browser.newPage()
9    await page.goto('https://bot.sannysoft.com')
10    await page.waitForTimeout(5000)
11    await page.screenshot({ path: 'stealth.png', fullPage: true })
12    await browser.close()
13  })

Please check out the main documentation to learn more about puppeteer-extra (Firefox usage, other Plugins, etc).

Status

• ✅ puppeteer-extra with stealth passes all public bot tests.

Please note: I consider this a friendly competition in a rather interesting cat and mouse game. If the other team (👋) wants to detect headless chromium there are still ways to do that (at least I noticed a few, which I'll tackle in future updates).

It's probably impossible to prevent all ways to detect headless chromium, but it should be possible to make it so difficult that it becomes cost-prohibitive or triggers too many false-positives to be feasible.

If something new comes up or you experience a problem, please do your homework and create a PR in a respectful way (this is Github, not reddit) or I might not be motivated to help. :)

Changelog

🎁 Note: Until we've automated changelog updates in markdown files please follow the #announcements channel in our discord server for the latest updates and changelog info.

Older changelog:

v2.4.7

• New: user-agent-override - Used to set a stealthy UA string, language & platform. This also fixes issues with the prior method of setting the Accept-Language header through request interception (#104, kudos to @Niek)
• New: navigator.vendor - Makes it possible to optionally override navigator.vendor (#110, thanks @Niek)
• Improved: navigator.webdriver: Now uses ES6 Proxies to pass instanceof tests (#117, thanks @aabbccsmith)
• Removed: user-agent, accept-language (now obsolete)

v2.4.2 / v2.4.1

• Improved: iframe.contentWindow - We now proxy the original window object and smartly redirect calls that might reveal it's true identity, as opposed to mocking it like peasants :)

v2.4.0

Let's ring the bell for round 2 in this cat and mouse fight 😄

• New: All evasions now have a specific before and after test to make make this whole topic less voodoo
• New: media.codecs - we spoof the presence of proprietary codecs in Chromium now
• New & improved: iframe.contentWindow - Found a way to fix srcdoc frame based detection without breaking recaptcha inline popup & other iframes (please report any issues)
• New: accept-language - Adds a missing Accept-Language header in headless (capitalized correctly, page.setExtraHTTPHeaders is all lowercase which can be detected)
• Improved: chrome.runtime - More extensive mocking of the chrome object
• ⭐️ All fpscanner tests are now green, as well as all intoli tests and the areyouheadless test

Test results (red is bad)

Vanilla puppeteer without stealth 😢

Puppeteer with stealth plugin 💯

Note: The MQ_SCREEN test is broken on their page (will fail in regular Chrome as well).

Tests have been done using this test site and these scripts.

Improved reCAPTCHA v3 scores

Using stealth also seems to help with maintaining a normal reCAPTCHA v3 score.

Note: The official test is to be taken with a grain of salt, as the score is calculated individually per site and multiple other factors (past behaviour, IP address, etc). Based on anecdotal observations it still seems to work as a rough indicator.

Tip: Have a look at the recaptcha plugin if you have issues with reCAPTCHAs.

API

Extends: PuppeteerExtraPlugin

Stealth mode: Applies various techniques to make detection of headless puppeteer harder. 💯

Purpose

There are a couple of ways the use of puppeteer can easily be detected by a target website. The addition of HeadlessChrome to the user-agent being only the most obvious one.

The goal of this plugin is to be the definite companion to puppeteer to avoid detection, applying new techniques as they surface.

As this cat & mouse game is in it's infancy and fast-paced the plugin is kept as flexibile as possible, to support quick testing and iterations.

Modularity

This plugin uses puppeteer-extra's dependency system to only require code mods for evasions that have been enabled, to keep things modular and efficient.

The stealth plugin is a convenience wrapper that requires multiple evasion techniques automatically and comes with defaults. You could also bypass the main module and require specific evasion plugins yourself, if you whish to do so (as they're standalone puppeteer-extra plugins):

1// bypass main module and require a specific stealth plugin directly:
2puppeteer.use(
3  require('puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp/evasions/console.debug')()
4)

Contributing

PRs are welcome, if you want to add a new evasion technique I suggest you look at the template to kickstart things.

Kudos

Thanks to Evan Sangaline and Paul Irish for kickstarting the discussion!

Example:

1const puppeteer = require('puppeteer-extra')
2// Enable stealth plugin with all evasions
3puppeteer.use(require('puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp')())
4;(async () => {
5  // Launch the browser in headless mode and set up a page.
6  const browser = await puppeteer.launch({
7    args: ['--no-sandbox'],
8    headless: true
9  })
10  const page = await browser.newPage()
11
12  // Navigate to the page that will perform the tests.
13  const testUrl =
14    'https://intoli.com/blog/' +
15    'not-possible-to-block-chrome-headless/chrome-headless-test.html'
16  await page.goto(testUrl)
17
18  // Save a screenshot of the results.
19  const screenshotPath = '/tmp/headless-test-result.png'
20  await page.screenshot({ path: screenshotPath })
21  console.log('have a look at the screenshot:', screenshotPath)
22
23  await browser.close()
24})()
25
26const pluginStealth = require('puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp')()
27console.log(pluginStealth.availableEvasions) // => Set { 'user-agent', 'console.debug' }
28puppeteer.use(pluginStealth)

.enabledEvasions

Type: Set<string>

Get all enabled evasions.

Enabled evasions can be configured either through opts or by modifying this property.

Example:

1// Remove specific evasion from enabled ones dynamically
2const pluginStealth = require('puppeteer-extra-plugin-stealth-lp')()
3pluginStealth.enabledEvasions.delete('console.debug')
4puppeteer.use(pluginStealth)