Duplicate Protection with Embedded Surveys Tutorial

Duplicate Protection Tab is Available to SurveyGizmo, Enterprise, and Dedicated Accounts

Restricting users from taking a survey more than once is called Duplicate Respondent (Vote) Protection within SurveyGizmo. While it provides some protection against multiple responses from a single individual, there are some considerations that are necessary. For instance, if you are using embedded surveys, some methods of Duplicate Protection are not supported with some embedding methods. Embedding options are listed and available on the Publish tab within the SurveyGizmo tool, and include: JavaScript embed, iFrame embed, and direct HTML embed.

Duplicate Vote Protection with Embedded Surveys

There are two primary types of duplicate protection for your survey: IP Based and Cookie Based protection. You can set these protections within your survey at the Pro and Enterprise plan levels by going to Project > Settings. Both have their benefits and drawbacks, so let's discuss those first.

• Browser Cookie based protection
  • Good for dedicated survey pages, not for embedding in multiple pages/sidebar/footer For one question polls, use Create Poll > Simple Poll instead for embedding in multiple pages
  • Cookie is stored on respondent's computer, but then can be cleared manually by the respondent
  • Switching computers or web browsers side-steps protection
  • Embedded surveys may not accept 3rd party cookies, based on browser security settings of the respondent
  • This is the best option where multiple respondents may come from a single IP address (schools, users inside the same business)
• IP Based protection
  • Respondent cannot change IP address easily (possible through proxies)
  • Families and companies usually share a single public IP address, so one respondent in a company will block the survey from all others sharing that same IP address
  • Best for diverse distribution and audiences (e.g. customer satisfaction surveys)

While none of these duplicate protection options alone provide a perfect solution, they do offer some protection against multiple responses from a single individual. For each type of embedding, the following duplicate protection is available:

• JavaScript - IP & Cookie
• iFrame - IP & URL Variable Based
• HTML - Not compatible with duplicate protection

File Uploads Question Type

As a quick note, the File Uploads question type is only compatible with the following embedded survey methods:

• iFrame
• HTML

It is not compatible with the JavaScript embed because of the limitations (for security reasons) of the JavaScript protocol itself rather than within SurveyGizmo.

Have questions? Want to comment on this? Join the discussion on our SurveyGizmo Support site.