AI crawlers / AI crawlers
Google-Pinpoint: what it does and what blocking it changes
What Google-Pinpoint is
Google-Pinpoint is a user-triggered fetcher listed by Google. It requests individual URLs that Pinpoint users specified as sources for their personal collections of documents. Google lists it with the user agent Google-Pinpoint.
| Fact | Google-Pinpoint |
|---|---|
| Operator | |
| Job | User-triggered fetch |
| robots.txt token | Google-Pinpoint |
| Follows robots.txt | Partial. Google says user-triggered fetchers generally ignore robots.txt rules because a user requested the fetch. |
| IP addresses | Reverse DNS check |
| Vendor page read | 24 October 2026 |
What the vendor says
In the vendor's words (English original): “The Google-Pinpoint fetcher requests individual URLs that Pinpoint users specified as sources for their personal collections of documents.”
Source: Google Search Central: Google user-triggered fetchers, read on 24 October 2026.
What happens if you block Google-Pinpoint
Google says that because the fetch was requested by a user, user-triggered fetchers generally ignore robots.txt rules. The Google page documents no robots.txt token for Google-Pinpoint.
The robots.txt lines
To allow Google-Pinpoint:
User-agent: Google-Pinpoint
Allow: /To block Google-Pinpoint:
User-agent: Google-Pinpoint
Disallow: /Paste a block into the robots.txt at the root of your host, for example https://example.com/robots.txt. A group for one token does not cover the operator's other crawlers.
The user-agent string the vendor shows:
Google-PinpointHow to tell a real request from a fake one
Google says user-triggered fetchers publish IP ranges in user-triggered-fetchers.json, user-triggered-fetchers-google.json and user-triggered-agents.json, and that the reverse DNS mask matches *-*-*-*.gae.googleusercontent.com or google-proxy-*-*-*-*.google.com depending on whether the fetcher is Google or user owned.
Compare with Google-GeminiNotebook
Google-GeminiNotebook: Both fetch URLs that users supplied as sources in a Google product, and both fall under Google's user-triggered fetcher rules.
Your own site
The free check in the box above tests eight crawlers (GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended, Bingbot and Googlebot). Google-Pinpoint is not one of them: read your robots.txt for a Google-Pinpoint group and look for the user agent in your server log. The full list of crawlers is on the AI crawler hub.
Questions people ask
Does Google-Pinpoint follow robots.txt?
Not always. Partial. Google says user-triggered fetchers generally ignore robots.txt rules because a user requested the fetch. A rule for Google-Pinpoint in robots.txt may therefore not stop it. To refuse it for certain, use a firewall or CDN rule that matches both the user agent and the published addresses.
How do I know Google-Pinpoint is really blocked?
robots.txt is only one layer: a CDN or firewall rule can also turn a crawler away, and a crawler can ignore the file. Check your server log for the user agent, and test the address from outside your network.
Sources
- Google Search Central: Google user-triggered fetchers
- Google Search Central: Overview of Google crawlers and fetchers
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