# How to keep staging and dev sites out of Google

> A public staging copy competes with the live site and often runs old code. Password-protect it or add noindex everywhere.

Security · HTML version: https://getreport.app/learn/staging-sites

## Public staging copy

Passing looks like: No public staging copy found.

**Why it matters.** A staging or dev copy that Google can index competes with the live site for its own content and often runs older, unpatched code. Anyone can find it.

**How to fix it.**

1. Put the staging site behind HTTP authentication or an IP allow-list, or delete it when the launch is done.
2. At minimum switch on "Discourage search engines" there and add a noindex X-Robots-Tag header.

Check your own page: https://getreport.app/