Short.io provides link cloaking for replacing a long URL with the short one in the browser address bar. For example, the link like "https://www.google.com.ua/maps/place/New+York,+NY,+USA/@40.6971494,-74.2598655,10z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x89c24fa5d33f083b:0xc80b8f06e177fe62!8m2!3d40.7127753!4d-74.0059728?hl=en&authuser=0" is replaced with "https://yourdomain.com/newyork". The feature's purpose is to hide possibly important parts of links like UTM parameters, affiliate code.

The most frequently cloaked websites among Short.io users are:

  1. Typeform.
  2. Cognitoforms.
  3. Formsite.
  4. Google Datastudio.
  5. Google Docs.
  6. Google Spreadsheets.
  7. Zoom.
  8. Amazon S3.
  9. Youtube.

If you are trying to cloak links with these services, the error "Cloaking is forbidden by destination URL with X-Frame-Options header" may occur. The main reason for its inception was to provide clickjacking protection. This includes a page rendering in a frame, iframe, or object. Iframes are used to embed and isolate third-party content into a website.

Google Maps forbids link cloaking. Sometimes you inevitably need to hide Google Maps' links because of the important information behind it. For this you need:

1. Go to Google Maps and find a needed destination.

2. Click Share.

shortio-cloaking

3. Open the Embed section > Copy the code.

shortio-cloaking

4. Extract the link from the embed code from the src value.

Example:

iframe src="https://www.google.com/maps/embed?pb=!1m18!1m12!1m3!1d387193.305935303!2d-74.25986548248684!3d40.69714941932609!2m3!1f0!2f0!3f0!3m2!1i1024!2i768!4f13.1!3m3!1m2!1s0x89c24fa5d33f083b%3A0xc80b8f06e177fe62!2sNew York%2C NY%2C USA!5e0!3m2!1sen!2sua!4v1599825748477!5m2!1sen!2sua" width="600" height="450" frameborder="0" style="border:0;" allowfullscreen="" aria-hidden="false" tabindex="0"></iframe

5. Shorten a link > Cloak it.

This way, the link will be shortened, and you will successfully hide important values.

Try Link Cloaking on Short.io

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What did you learn?

  • link cloaking is forbidden
  • x-frame error
  • how to hide links
  • google maps embed link

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