If you run a website where digital content (pictures, files, and so on) is your livelihood, then you may want to turn on this feature. Hotlink protection will stop people on other websites linking directly to your files unless they have approval from you.
To turn this on you need to define:
The list of domains that are permitted to link to your files. cPanel will automatically add any of your own domains to the list of approved domains but feel free to edit these as needed.
The list of file extensions (JPG, MP3, and so on) that you want to protect. cPanel will automatically add a list of common file extensions but feel free to edit these as needed.
A URL to redirect people to if they try to hotlink to your files (typically a page on your site that says Sorry, you can’t access this file unless you are a member of my site.)
If you want to allow people who manually type an address pointing to one of the files on your website to access the file...