How to check if the request is an AJAX request with PHP
ajax, php, xmlhttprequest
Solution
There is no sure-fire way of knowing that a request was made via Ajax. You can never trust data coming from the client. You could use a couple of different methods but they can be easily overcome by spoofing.
Problem
I would like to check server-side if a request to my php page is an ajax request or not. I saw two ways to do this: First way: sending a `GET` parameter in the request which tells the page that this is an AJAX request (=`mypage.php?ajax`) mypage.php: ``` if(isset($_GET['ajax'])) { //this is an ajax request, process data here. } ``` Second way: set a header to the `xmlHttpRequest`: client-side js: ``` xmlHttpRequestObject.open(“GET”,url,true); xmlHttpRequestObject.setRequestHeader('X-Requested-With', 'XMLHttpRequest'); ``` mypage.php: ``` if (!empty($_SERVER['HTTP_X_REQUESTED_WITH']) && strtolower($_SERVER['HTTP_X_REQUESTED_WITH']) == 'xmlhttprequest' ) { //request is ajax } ``` The fact is, those two ways of doing it can easily be hacked, so it's not secure to check if i get an AJAX request like this. How can i check if i'm receiving an AJAX request?