HTTP Error 403 with php curl

Question

I want to do a http request with curl but can't get a valid response from the server.

the $url variable is filled with the string: "http://www.transfermarkt.de/borussia-dortmund/startseite/verein/16/index.html"

function request($url) {

    $ch = curl_init($url);
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

    $result = curl_exec($ch);
    $statuscode = curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
    $statustext = curl_getinfo($ch);
    curl_close($ch);
    if($statuscode!=200){
    echo "HTTP ERROR ".$statuscode."<br>";
    echo "<pre>";
    echo var_dump($statustext);
    echo "</pre>";
    return "false";

    }
    return $result;
}

I grouped the information you give to the top of the question and removed unnecessary information such as 'thanks'. also formatting code helps understanding faster what could be the problem. — Félix Adriyel Gagnon-Grenier
– Félix Adriyel Gagnon-Grenier, Commented Mar 6, 2015 at 16:54

Hans Z. · Accepted Answer · 2015-03-02 21:36:42Z

2

That website checks for a valid User-Agent header which the cURL PHP client does not provide by default (though the commandline client does). To overcome that you can add:

curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERAGENT, 'User-Agent: curl/7.39.0');

or similar.

Edit: full code succesfully tested:

<?php

function request($url){
        $ch = curl_init($url);
        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_VERBOSE, 1);

        curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_USERAGENT, 'User-Agent: curl/7.39.0');

        $result = curl_exec($ch);
        $statuscode = curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
        $statustext = curl_getinfo($ch);
        curl_close($ch);
        if($statuscode!=200){
        echo "HTTP ERROR ".$statuscode."<br>";
        echo "<pre>";
        echo var_dump($statustext);
        echo "</pre>";
        return "false";

        }
        return $result;
    }

echo request('http://www.transfermarkt.de/borussia-dortmund/startseite/verein/16/index.html');

?>

edited Mar 2, 2015 at 21:36

answered Mar 2, 2015 at 21:28

Hans Z.

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1 Comment

Hassan Saeed Over a year ago

super answer "curl/7.39.0" is magical agent i dont know what is meaning of this agent but after testing 50-100 user agent only this works for me.thanks alot

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