Country Access Control

The SDLC Country Block plugin lets you restrict access to individual posts and pages based on the visitor’s country, while keeping SEO bots and crawlers unblocked for safe indexing.

🔐 4 Layers of Country Detection

To ensure maximum compatibility, the plugin checks for the visitor’s country in this order:
1. Cloudflare header (CF-IPCountry)
2. Server GeoIP variables (if your hosting environment provides them)
3. PHP GeoIP extension (geoip_country_code_by_name)
4. Wordfence plugin (using Wordfence GEO detection)

⚠️ Note: At least one of these extensions or plugins must be enabled. If none are active, the plugin cannot detect visitor countries.

✨ Features

• Per-post/page multi-select of countries (full ISO list)
• SEO-safe: bots/crawlers can bypass blocks
• Choose action: redirect to endpoint (/blocked), redirect to custom URL, or 403
• Customizable endpoint slug
• Role-based bypass (e.g., admin, editor)
• Optional admin-only debug banner
• Proper sanitization, escaping, and nonces
• Sets Vary: CF-IPCountry for cache correctness
• Clean uninstall (removes options and post meta)

This plugin is maintained by SDLC CORP — a Digital Transformation Company with expertise in:
– WordPress Development
– Shopify Solutions
– Artificial Intelligence (AI) & Machine Learning
– Model Development and NLP (Natural Language Processing)
– Enterprise-grade AI Development Services

By publishing this open-source plugin, SDLC CORP demonstrates its commitment to empowering developers and businesses with scalable AI-driven solutions and modern web technologies.

Requirements & Compatibility

For the plugin to work, at least one of the following extensions or plugins must be enabled on your server:

1. Cloudflare → Enable the IP Geolocation setting in your Cloudflare dashboard (adds the CF-IPCountry header).
2. Server GeoIP → Your hosting provider must support GeoIP (ask your host if they provide GEOIP_COUNTRY_CODE).
3. PHP GeoIP Extension → Install and enable the PHP geoip extension on your server (may require server admin/hosting support).
4. Wordfence Plugin → Install the free Wordfence Security plugin and enable its country blocking/GeoIP feature.

➡️ At least one of these must be active. If none are available, the plugin cannot detect visitor countries.

Third-Party Compatibility

This plugin is designed to work with third-party services such as Cloudflare and Wordfence when available.
SDLC Country Block is an independent plugin and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Cloudflare or Wordfence.

License

This plugin is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This plugin is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

A copy of the GPL v2 license is included in this package. You can also see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html.

Trademark

“SDLC CORP” and the SDLC CORP logo are trademarks of SDLC CORP.
The GPL license covers the plugin’s source code. It does not grant rights to use SDLC CORP’s trademarks or branding in modified versions in a way that suggests endorsement or affiliation without permission.

1. Upload the sdlc-country-block folder to /wp-content/plugins/.
2. Activate the plugin via Plugins in WordPress Admin.
3. Configure global settings under Settings → Country Block.
4. Edit a post/page → use the Country Block meta box → select restricted countries.
5. Ensure that at least one detection method (Cloudflare, server GeoIP, PHP GeoIP, or Wordfence) is available for the plugin to work.

1.3.1

• Minor fixes and improvements.
• Updated documentation and metadata for WordPress.org release.