Wikipedia:AWSURL

This is an essay.

It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

An AWS URL is one which contains &Expires= in the URL. These URLs are generated on demand by Amazon AWS and contain a self-destruct mechanism. They typically last for about 60 minutes, then cease to function. As such they are almost never appropriate for use on Wikipedia due to WP:LINKROT.

Example url:

https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/60456552/semihatopal_writing_sample_220190901-74704-1rwppnt.pdf?1567369083=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DEverybody_Wants_Secularism_But_Which_One.pdf&Expires=1623134734&Signature=bPA9fRS9BRa18AZc~hGfZ4qT~lgzpKv7hFsX3WpJp3zrGwn5wx5HgAEFd~AfcIXsuDi~kY96IKzA3klHAGo~JpUn~LKJUpRfV8MiRaQSJagpnwW2Jum6G5qoqmvaSV8pznvMQEeBjgoz~BWHhkUAZ6UjDVWSWxAWffha~cuObV93DpNn2q5VnO7d5uKvljG-YjdluBQv~Go6TFwGgJyOuVlQWpKWIX7d2vvPvBpnIjYJXATy0D4-ko8HjpxgCeYl98DOGel3kEkxZnKwoDwa5GrOSoksIsly25vAa8RbfVkRJK5Gnf-oAM2qftrnc0mSKt3oXFKucFISgO7D0B4kpA__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA

Note the presence of &Expires=1623134734. This is a Timestamp showing seconds since 1970, aka Unix time. It can be converted with this tool. After that date/time, the URL expires. Typically it is 60 minutes from the time the URL was first generated/retrieved.

The example shows cloudfront.net, but the domain could be anything. The only indication of these URLs is the presence of &Expires=. It is a service offered by Amazon AWS to any customer hosting content there.

What should you do?

If it's literally https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net the document should be available at academia.edu. See for example Special:Diff/1101115458/1101304633. (the cloudfront URL was probably sourced from Google Scholar). Try this Google search: "title of article" site:academia.edu
If it's literally http://antcat.s3.amazonaws.com it is probably sourced to www.researchgate.net see example Special:Diff/1075472831/1151221786

Otherwise, find a different source with a Google search on the article title.

Sometimes these URLs also require login/password credentials that may be seamlessly invisible to you, but will stop everyone else (such as academia.edu). Even if you save it at Wayback (and tests have been largely unsuccessful archiving these URLs, even when not-yet expired), it could respond with an error unable to login. Even if it seems like it is working right now, it might expire soon enough.

In most cases, most of the time, these URLs never work on Wikipedia. They should be avoided.