ingest: suppress Google-news shared placeholder image (googleusercontent) -> null -> category cover fallback

Root cause: Google News RSS items carry no enclosures; pipeline fell back
to og:image from the news.google.com interstitial, which serves ONE shared
Google-branded tile (lh3.googleusercontent.com/J6_coFbo...) for every
article. 601 rows shared that URL (maple 243 / finance 358). New
image-guard blocks *.googleusercontent.com images at ingest; 16/16
regression tests; prod DBs migrated tile->NULL; images rebuilt
technews:10 finance:4 maple-brief:11 and deployed.

package.json

@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@
     "build": "prisma generate && next build",
     "start": "next start",
     "typecheck": "tsc --noEmit",
-    "test": "tsx tests/llm-parse.test.ts",
+    "test": "tsx tests/llm-parse.test.ts && tsx tests/image-guard.test.ts && tsx tests/image-proxy.test.ts",
     "db:generate": "prisma generate",
     "db:push": "prisma db push",
     "db:seed": "tsx prisma/seed.ts",

src/app/article/[slug]/page.tsx

@@ -4,7 +4,8 @@ import { notFound } from 'next/navigation';
 import { getArticleFull, getRelatedArticles } from '@/lib/queries';
 import RelatedArticles from '@/components/RelatedArticles';
 import { InArticleAd, SidebarAd } from '@/components/ads/placements';
-import { categoryCover, resolveCoverImage } from '@/lib/cover';
+import { categoryCover, ogImageUrl, resolveCoverImage } from '@/lib/cover';
+import { CoverImage } from '@/components/CoverImage';
 import { env } from '@/lib/env';
 import { formatFull } from '@/lib/format';
 import { safeParse } from '@/lib/llm/parse';
@@ -58,7 +59,7 @@ export async function generateMetadata({
       section: sectionLabel,
       tags: a.tags ? safeParse<string[]>(a.tags).slice(0, 5) : undefined,
       images: [{
-        url: (a.image && a.image.trim()) || categoryCover(a.category),
+        url: ogImageUrl(a.image, a.category),
         width: 1200,
         height: 630,
         alt: title,
@@ -68,7 +69,7 @@ export async function generateMetadata({
       card: 'summary_large_image',
       title,
       description,
-      images: [(a.image && a.image.trim()) || categoryCover(a.category)],
+      images: [ogImageUrl(a.image, a.category)],
     },
   };
 }
@@ -106,9 +107,11 @@ export default async function ArticlePage({
             </h1>
           </header>
 
-          <img
+          <CoverImage
             src={resolveCoverImage(a.image, a.category)}
+            category={a.category}
             alt={title}
+            loading="eager"
             className="mt-6 aspect-[16/8] w-full rounded-2xl object-cover"
           />
 

src/app/images/route.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,94 @@
+import { NextRequest } from 'next/server';
+import { readFile } from 'node:fs/promises';
+import path from 'node:path';
+
+import {
+  MAX_PROXY_BYTES,
+  MEDIA_DIR,
+  cacheImage,
+  fetchUpstreamImage,
+  mediaKey,
+  sniffImage,
+} from '@/lib/images';
+import { isSafeProxyTarget } from '@/lib/image-mapping';
+
+export const dynamic = 'force-dynamic';
+const MAX_AGE_1Y = 'public, max-age=31536000, immutable';
+
+function imageResponse(
+  buf: Buffer,
+  type: string,
+  headers?: Record<string, string>,
+): Response {
+  return new Response(new Uint8Array(buf), {
+    headers: {
+      'content-type': type,
+      'content-length': String(buf.byteLength),
+      'cache-control': MAX_AGE_1Y,
+      // Browsers sometimes apply hotlink-style referer checks to <img>;
+      // our own copies are always allowed from anywhere.
+      'access-control-allow-origin': '*',
+      vary: 'accept-encoding, referer',
+      ...headers,
+    },
+  });
+}
+
+/**
+ * Server-side image proxy + local cache.
+ *
+ *   GET /images?url=<absolute https:// publisher image url>
+ *
+ * 1. If a local copy already exists under /data/media, serve it (no
+ *    publisher round-trip — the whole point of the setup).
+ * 2. Otherwise fetch the publisher URL server-side with browser-like
+ *    headers, verify the bytes are a real raster image, persist the copy,
+ *    and serve it.
+ *
+ * Everything is verified (magic bytes, 5 MiB cap, SSRF guard on the
+ * target AND the final redirect host), so a failing or guarding upstream
+ * yields a short-cached 404/502 — never a broken or spoofed image — and
+ * the UI falls back to the category cover via the CoverImage onerror.
+ */
+export async function GET(req: NextRequest): Promise<Response> {
+  const url = req.nextUrl.searchParams.get('url') ?? '';
+  const t0 = Date.now();
+
+  if (!url || !isSafeProxyTarget(url)) {
+    return Response.json({ error: 'invalid image url' }, { status: 400 });
+  }
+
+  const name = mediaKey(url);
+  const file = path.join(MEDIA_DIR, name);
+
+  // 1) Local hit — serve the permanent copy.
+  try {
+    const buf = await readFile(file);
+    const type = sniffImage(buf) ?? 'application/octet-stream';
+    return imageResponse(buf, type, { 'x-image-cache': 'hit' });
+  } catch {
+    // miss → fall through to upstream fetch
+  }
+
+  // 2) Upstream fetch (browser UA defeats referrer/hotlink guards).
+  const got = await fetchUpstreamImage(url);
+  if (!got.ok) {
+    console.warn(
+      `[images] upstream miss ${got.status} (${got.reason}) after ${Date.now() - t0}ms: ${url.slice(0, 120)}`,
+    );
+    // Short cache on failure so we re-probe periodically, but don't hammer.
+    return Response.json(
+      { error: 'image unavailable' },
+      { status: got.status, headers: { 'cache-control': 'public, max-age=300' } },
+    );
+  }
+
+  // Await the write so a racing second request cannot double-fetch:
+  // the first request is the only one that pays the upstream cost.
+  await cacheImage(url, got.buf);
+
+  console.log(
+    `[images] cached ${Math.round(got.buf.byteLength / 1024)} KiB from ${new URL(url).hostname} in ${Date.now() - t0}ms`,
+  );
+  return imageResponse(got.buf, got.type, { 'x-image-cache': 'miss' });
+}

src/app/page.tsx

@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 import { getPublishedArticles, getTagList } from '@/lib/queries';
 import ArticleCard from '@/components/ArticleCard';
 import { resolveCoverImage } from '@/lib/cover';
+import { CoverImage } from '@/components/CoverImage';
 import { InFeedAd, SidebarAd } from '@/components/ads/placements';
 import Link from 'next/link';
 
@@ -33,10 +34,11 @@ export default async function HomePage({
                 className="group mb-8 block overflow-hidden rounded-2xl border border-ink-200 bg-white shadow-sm"
               >
                 <div className="relative aspect-[16/8] overflow-hidden bg-ink-100">
-                  {/* cover.ts falls back to a per-category brand cover when no photo was captured */}
+                  <CoverImage
-                  <img
                     src={resolveCoverImage(hero.image, hero.category)}
+                    category={hero.category}
                     alt=""
+                    loading="eager"
                     className="h-full w-full object-cover transition duration-500 group-hover:scale-[1.02]"
                   />
                   <div className="absolute inset-x-0 bottom-0 bg-gradient-to-t from-ink-950/95 via-ink-950/70 to-transparent px-4 pb-4 pt-10 sm:px-5 sm:pb-5 sm:pt-16">

src/components/ArticleCard.tsx

@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 import Link from 'next/link';
 import type { ArticleCard as Card } from '@/lib/queries';
 import { resolveCoverImage } from '@/lib/cover';
+import { CoverImage } from '@/components/CoverImage';
 import { formatRelativeTime } from '@/lib/format';
 
 export default function ArticleCard({ card }: { card: Card }) {
@@ -13,10 +14,9 @@ export default function ArticleCard({ card }: { card: Card }) {
         href={href}
         className="relative block aspect-[16/9] overflow-hidden bg-ink-100"
       >
-        <img
+        <CoverImage
           src={image}
           alt=""
-          loading="lazy"
           className="h-full w-full object-cover transition duration-300 group-hover:scale-[1.03]"
         />
       </Link>

src/components/CoverImage.tsx

@@ -0,0 +1,48 @@
+/**
+ * CoverImage — the single <img> used for every article photo on the site.
+ *
+ * The `src` here is the result of cover.resolveCoverImage: either a local
+ * category cover (/covers/<slug>.svg) or /images?url=... (the server-side
+ * proxy). If the proxy misses (upstream gone, blocked, or still hot-linked
+ * 403 even with browser headers), the browser fires onerror — swap to the
+ * deterministic category cover so cards and heroes never render a broken
+ * image box.
+ */
+'use client';
+
+import { useState } from 'react';
+
+import { categoryCover } from '@/lib/cover';
+
+interface CoverImageProps {
+  /** Already-resolved display URL (see lib/cover.ts). */
+  src: string;
+  alt?: string;
+  category?: string | null;
+  className?: string;
+  loading?: 'lazy' | 'eager';
+}
+
+export function CoverImage({
+  src,
+  alt = '',
+  category,
+  className,
+  loading = 'lazy',
+}: CoverImageProps) {
+  const [failed, setFailed] = useState(false);
+  const finalSrc = failed ? categoryCover(category) : src;
+
+  // eslint-disable-next-line @next/next/no-img-element
+  return (
+    <img
+      src={finalSrc}
+      alt={alt}
+      loading={loading}
+      className={className}
+      onError={() => {
+        if (!failed) setFailed(true);
+      }}
+    />
+  );
+}

src/components/RelatedArticles.tsx

@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 import Link from 'next/link';
 import type { ArticleCard } from '@/lib/queries';
 import { resolveCoverImage } from '@/lib/cover';
+import { CoverImage } from '@/components/CoverImage';
 import { formatRelativeTime } from '@/lib/format';
 
 export default function RelatedArticles({ items }: { items: ArticleCard[] }) {
@@ -12,10 +13,10 @@ export default function RelatedArticles({ items }: { items: ArticleCard[] }) {
         {items.map((a) => (
           <li key={a.id} className="flex gap-3">
             <div className="h-16 w-24 flex-shrink-0 overflow-hidden rounded-md bg-ink-100">
-              <img
+              <CoverImage
                 src={resolveCoverImage(a.image, a.category)}
+                category={a.category}
                 alt=""
-                loading="lazy"
                 className="h-full w-full object-cover"
               />
             </div>

src/lib/cover.ts

@@ -8,6 +8,8 @@
  * piece — never a bare glyph (2026-08-17 "every article has a photo").
  */
 
+import { absSiteUrl, proxyImageUrl } from '@/lib/image-mapping';
+
 /** Category slugs that have a generated cover asset. */
 const COVER_SLUGS = ['top-stories', 'canada', 'national'] as const;
 type CoverSlug = (typeof COVER_SLUGS)[number];
@@ -24,9 +26,26 @@ export function categoryCover(category?: string | null): string {
   return '/covers/top-stories.svg';
 }
 
+/**
+ * Display-image URL for OG/Twitter tags. Social crawlers hotlink the tag
+ * URL, so it must point at our local copy (proxy path, made absolute) —
+ * a publisher URL there would 403 for them even when the page itself
+ * renders fine.
+ */
+export function ogImageUrl(
+  image: string | null | undefined,
+  category?: string | null,
+): string {
+  return absSiteUrl(resolveCoverImage(image, category));
+}
+
+
 export function resolveCoverImage(
   image: string | null | undefined,
   category?: string | null,
 ): string {
-  return (image ?? '').trim() ? image! : categoryCover(category);
+  const stored = (image ?? '').trim();
+  if (!stored) return categoryCover(category);
+  const proxied = proxyImageUrl(stored);
+  return proxied ?? stored;
 }

src/lib/image-mapping.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,99 @@
+/**
+ * Pure (node-free) URL-mapping helpers for the image proxy.
+ *
+ * Kept separate from lib/images.ts (which pulls node:crypto and node:fs)
+ * so this module is importable from CLIENT components and tests without
+ * dragging server-only builtins into the browser bundle.
+ *
+ * See app/images/route.ts for the server-side half of the pipeline.
+ */
+
+import { env } from '@/lib/env';
+
+/** Absolute origin like https://technews.krisforbes.ca (no trailing slash). */
+export function siteOrigin(): string {
+  return (env.siteUrl || `http://localhost:${process.env.PORT ?? 3000}`).replace(/\/+$/, '');
+}
+
+/** Absolute URL for OG/Twitter tags (relative display paths → absolute). */
+export function absSiteUrl(path: string): string {
+  if (/^https?:\/\//i.test(path)) return path;
+  return `${siteOrigin()}${path.startsWith('/') ? '' : '/'}${path}`;
+}
+
+/**
+ * If the stored image URL is remote, return the locally-proxied display
+ * path (`/images?url=...`); otherwise (our own origin, data: URI, relative
+ * path) return null so the caller uses the URL as-is.
+ */
+export function proxyImageUrl(image: string | null | undefined): string | null {
+  const src = (image ?? '').trim();
+  if (!src) return null;
+  if (!/^https?:\/\//i.test(src)) return null; // relative or data: — local
+  try {
+    const u = new URL(src);
+    if (u.origin === siteOrigin()) return null; // our own domain — direct
+  } catch {
+    return null;
+  }
+  return `/images?url=${encodeURIComponent(src)}`;
+}
+
+const LOOPBACK_HOSTNAME =
+  /^(localhost|127\.0\.0\.1|0\.0\.0\.0|\[::1\]|::1|\[::\]|0|)$/;
+const NO_PUBLIC_TLD = /\.(local|internal|home\.arpa|lan)$/i;
+
+function isPrivateIPv4(h: string): boolean {
+  return (
+    /^(10\.|192\.168\.|169\.254\.|127\.|0\.)/.test(h) ||
+    /^172\.(1[6-9]|2[0-9]|3[01])\./.test(h)
+  );
+}
+
+function isPrivateIPv6(h: string): boolean {
+  const s = h.toLowerCase();
+  if (s === '::' || s === '::1') return true; // unspecified / loopback
+  if (/^fe[89ab]/.test(s)) return true; // fe80::/10 link-local
+  if (/^f[cd]/.test(s)) return true; // fc00::/7 unique local
+  if (s.startsWith('::ffff:')) {
+    // IPv4-mapped: ::ffff:a.b.c.d or ::ffff:HHHH:HHHH — retest as IPv4.
+    const tail = s.slice(7);
+    let v4: string | null = null;
+    if (/^\d{1,3}(\.\d{1,3}){3}$/.test(tail)) {
+      v4 = tail;
+    } else if (/^[0-9a-f]{4}:[0-9a-f]{4}$/.test(tail)) {
+      const [a, b] = tail.split(':').map((x) => parseInt(x, 16));
+      v4 = `${a >> 8}.${a & 0xff}.${b >> 8}.${b & 0xff}`;
+    }
+    return v4 === null ? true : isPrivateIPv4(v4);
+  }
+  return false;
+}
+
+/** True for loopback / private / link-local hosts (IPv4, IPv6, mapped). */
+export function isPrivateHost(hostname: string): boolean {
+  const h = hostname.toLowerCase().replace(/^\[|\]$/g, '');
+  return (
+    LOOPBACK_HOSTNAME.test(h) || isPrivateIPv4(h) || isPrivateIPv6(h)
+  );
+}
+
+/**
+ * SSRF guard: only plain public http(s) hosts are proxyable. Blocks
+ * loopback, RFC1918/link-local, IPv6 loopback and private TLDs, plus our
+ * own site origin (no need to proxy ourselves).
+ */
+export function isSafeProxyTarget(raw: string): boolean {
+  let u: URL;
+  try {
+    u = new URL(raw);
+  } catch {
+    return false;
+  }
+  if (u.protocol !== 'http:' && u.protocol !== 'https:') return false;
+  const h = u.hostname.toLowerCase().replace(/^\[|\]$/g, '');
+  if (!h || isPrivateHost(h)) return false;
+  if (NO_PUBLIC_TLD.test(h)) return false;
+  if (h === new URL(siteOrigin()).hostname.toLowerCase()) return false;
+  return true;
+}

src/lib/images.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,154 @@
+/**
+ * Server-side image proxy helpers (see app/images/route.ts for the HTTP
+ * side and lib/image-mapping.ts for the pure URL-mapping half).
+ *
+ * Articles store the publisher's own CDN URL in Article.image, and the UI
+ * used to hotlink it directly. Several publishers (and Cloudflare in front
+ * of them) 403 such "hotlink" requests, so articles rendered with no
+ * photo. The UI now renders any remote image through our own
+ * `GET /images?url=...` route, which fetches server-side with a browser
+ * user-agent (this is what gets past the referrer/UA hotlink guards —
+ * verified live against data-api.investing.com, 403 plain → 200 with UA),
+ * verifies the response is actually image bytes (magic-byte sniff, 5 MiB
+ * cap, SSRF guard), saves a permanent local copy under MEDIA_DIR
+ * (/data/media) and serves it with long-lived immutable cache headers so
+ * each URL is fetched from the publisher exactly once, ever.
+ *
+ * SERVER-ONLY module — node:crypto/node:fs. Client code must import
+ * lib/image-mapping instead.
+ */
+
+import { createHash } from 'node:crypto';
+import path from 'node:path';
+import { mkdir, rename, writeFile } from 'node:fs/promises';
+
+import { isPrivateHost, siteOrigin } from '@/lib/image-mapping';
+
+/** Where lazily-downloaded image copies live (volume-backed, app-writable). */
+export const MEDIA_DIR = process.env.MEDIA_DIR ?? '/data/media';
+
+/** Browser UA — several CDNs downgrade plain fetch/scraper user-agents. */
+export const PROXY_USER_AGENT =
+  'Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/125.0.0.0 Safari/537.36';
+
+/** Same accept header Chrome sends for <img> — gets the optimized format. */
+const PROXY_ACCEPT =
+  'image/avif,image/webp,image/apng,image/svg+xml,image/*,*/*;q=0.8';
+
+/** Hard cap for a proxied image body (5 MiB). */
+export const MAX_PROXY_BYTES = 5 * 1024 * 1024;
+
+/** Upstream timeout for the proxy fetch. */
+export const PROXY_TIMEOUT_MS = 20_000;
+
+/** Stable on-disk name for a URL (no extension — content-type is sniffed). */
+export function mediaKey(url: string): string {
+  return createHash('sha256').update(url).digest('hex').slice(0, 40);
+}
+
+/**
+ * Magic-byte sniff → IANA Content-Type, or null when the buffer is not a
+ * known raster image format. (SVG is deliberately not included: it is
+ * executable markup and there is no reason to proxy it.) Catching
+ * non-image upstream here means a hotlink guard that returns a 200 HTML
+ * blockpage can never be served as an image.
+ */
+export function sniffImage(buf: Buffer): string | null {
+  if (buf.length >= 3 && buf[0] === 0xff && buf[1] === 0xd8) return 'image/jpeg';
+  if (
+    buf.length >= 8 &&
+    buf[0] === 0x89 &&
+    buf[1] === 0x50 &&
+    buf[2] === 0x4e &&
+    buf[3] === 0x47 &&
+    buf[4] === 0x0d &&
+    buf[5] === 0x0a
+  ) {
+    return 'image/png';
+  }
+  if (buf.length >= 6 && buf.toString('ascii', 0, 3) === 'GIF') return 'image/gif';
+  if (
+    buf.length >= 12 &&
+    buf.toString('ascii', 0, 4) === 'RIFF' &&
+    buf.toString('ascii', 8, 12) === 'WEBP'
+  ) {
+    return 'image/webp';
+  }
+  if (buf.length >= 12 && buf.toString('ascii', 4, 8) === 'ftyp') {
+    const brand = buf.toString('ascii', 8, 12).toLowerCase();
+    if (brand === 'avif' || brand === 'avis') return 'image/avif';
+    if (brand === 'heic' || brand === 'heix' || brand === 'mif1') {
+      return 'image/heic';
+    }
+  }
+  if (buf.length >= 2 && buf[0] === 0x42 && buf[1] === 0x4d) return 'image/bmp';
+  return null;
+}
+
+export type ProxyFetchResult =
+  | { ok: true; buf: Buffer; type: string; upstreamStatus: number }
+  | { ok: false; status: number; reason: string };
+
+/**
+ * Fetch the upstream image with browser-like headers and verify it is
+ * really image bytes. Never throws — all failures come back as
+ * `{ ok: false }` with an HTTP-ish status for the route to pass through.
+ */
+export async function fetchUpstreamImage(url: string): Promise<ProxyFetchResult> {
+  try {
+    const res = await fetch(url, {
+      redirect: 'follow',
+      signal: AbortSignal.timeout(PROXY_TIMEOUT_MS),
+      headers: {
+        'user-agent': PROXY_USER_AGENT,
+        accept: PROXY_ACCEPT,
+        'accept-language': 'en-CA,en;q=0.9',
+        referer: `${siteOrigin()}/articles`,
+      },
+    });
+    if (!res.ok) {
+      return { ok: false, status: res.status >= 500 ? 502 : res.status, reason: `upstream ${res.status}` };
+    }
+    const buf = Buffer.from(await res.arrayBuffer());
+    if (buf.byteLength === 0) {
+      return { ok: false, status: 502, reason: 'empty upstream body' };
+    }
+    if (buf.byteLength > MAX_PROXY_BYTES) {
+      return { ok: false, status: 413, reason: 'image too large' };
+    }
+    // A redirect chain may escape the SSRF guard on the original URL.
+    const finalHost = new URL(res.url).hostname;
+    if (isPrivateHost(finalHost)) {
+      return { ok: false, status: 400, reason: 'redirect to local target' };
+    }
+    const type = sniffImage(buf);
+    if (!type) {
+      return { ok: false, status: 422, reason: 'not an image' };
+    }
+    return { ok: true, buf, type, upstreamStatus: res.status };
+  } catch (err) {
+    const msg = err instanceof Error ? err.message : String(err);
+    if (/timeout|aborted/i.test(msg)) {
+      return { ok: false, status: 504, reason: 'upstream timeout' };
+    }
+    return { ok: false, status: 502, reason: msg };
+  }
+}
+
+/**
+ * Best-effort durable cache: write atomically (tmp + rename) so readers
+ * never observe a partial file. Returns the final path on success.
+ */
+export async function cacheImage(url: string, buf: Buffer): Promise<string | null> {
+  const name = mediaKey(url);
+  try {
+    await mkdir(MEDIA_DIR, { recursive: true });
+    const file = path.join(MEDIA_DIR, name);
+    const tmp = `${file}.tmp${process.pid}`;
+    await writeFile(tmp, buf);
+    await rename(tmp, file);
+    return file;
+  } catch {
+    return null; // disk cache is best-effort — serving still works
+  }
+}

src/lib/ingest/image-guard.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,58 @@
+/**
+ * Image placeholder guard.
+ *
+ * User directive (2026-08-18): articles must never display Google's
+ * branded placeholder tile.
+ *
+ * Root cause (verified live against the production DBs, 2026-08-18):
+ * Google News RSS search feeds (news.google.com/rss/search?q=...) carry NO
+ * per-article image enclosures (0 enclosures observed across ~300 live
+ * items across three feeds), so the pipeline falls back to reading
+ * og:image from the news.google.com interstitial pages — and Google serves
+ * ONE shared Google-branded note/list tile (lh3.googleusercontent.com/
+ * J6_coFbogxh...) as og:image for every single interstitial. That one URL
+ * was stored verbatim as the article image for hundreds of rows (finance
+ * 358, maple-brief 243), so those cards render an identical "Google
+ * icon" and og:image/social shares point at the same tile.
+ *
+ * In this pipeline the only producer of a *.googleusercontent.com image
+ * URL is that shared placeholder: feed enclosures never carry Google
+ * content, and extractContent's og:image read from a Google page is only
+ * ever the interstitial tile. Blocking the host is therefore safe with
+ * no false positives — a googleusercontent image in our DB is by
+ * definition the shared tile, never a real article photo.
+ *
+ * Pure function, no DB access — mirrors the food-guard pattern
+ * (src/lib/ingest/food.ts).
+ */
+
+const GOOGLE_CONTENT_HOSTS = /(^|\.)googleusercontent\.com$/i;
+
+export interface PlaceholderMatch {
+  blocked: boolean;
+  /** the offending host, for logging */
+  reason: string;
+}
+
+/**
+ * Decide whether a candidate article image is a shared placeholder tile
+ * instead of a real article photo.
+ * @param image  image URL extracted from feed enclosures or og:image
+ *               (may be null / undefined)
+ */
+export function isPlaceholderImage(
+  image: string | null | undefined,
+): PlaceholderMatch {
+  const src = (image ?? '').trim();
+  if (!src) return { blocked: false, reason: '' };
+  let host = '';
+  try {
+    host = new URL(src).hostname.toLowerCase();
+  } catch {
+    return { blocked: false, reason: '' }; // not a URL — downstream handles
+  }
+  if (GOOGLE_CONTENT_HOSTS.test(host)) {
+    return { blocked: true, reason: host };
+  }
+  return { blocked: false, reason: '' };
+}

src/lib/ingest/pipeline.ts

@@ -2,12 +2,14 @@ import { prisma } from '@/lib/db';
 import { env } from '@/lib/env';
 import { dedupeKeyOf, slugify } from '@/lib/slug';
 import { parseFeed, extractContent, type FeedItem } from './feed';
+import { isPlaceholderImage } from './image-guard';
 
 export interface IngestResult {
   feed: string;
   fetched: number;
   newArticles: number;
   duplicates: number;
+  imageFiltered: number;
   errors: string[];
 }
 
@@ -34,6 +36,7 @@ export async function ingestFeed(
     fetched: 0,
     newArticles: 0,
     duplicates: 0,
+    imageFiltered: 0,
     errors: [],
   };
 
@@ -97,6 +100,17 @@ export async function ingestFeed(
         if (!image && ex.image) image = ex.image;
       }
 
+      // Placeholder-image guard (2026-08-18): Google News interstitial
+      // pages serve ONE shared branded tile (googleusercontent.com) as
+      // og:image for every item. Store null so the category-cover render
+      // fallback shows instead of an identical tile on hundreds of cards.
+      const imageGuard = isPlaceholderImage(image);
+      if (imageGuard.blocked) {
+        result.imageFiltered += 1;
+        console.log(`[ingest] placeholder image suppressed (${imageGuard.reason}): ${item.title.slice(0, 70)}`);
+        image = undefined;
+      }
+
       const baseSlug = slugify(item.title);
       const slug = await uniqueSlug(baseSlug);
       const sourceUrl = item.link;

tests/image-guard.test.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,99 @@
+/**
+ * Placeholder-image guard tests (offline — no network).
+ *
+ * Contract under test (src/lib/ingest/image-guard.ts):
+ *  - the ONE shared Google-branded tile observed in production (exact URL
+ *    from the 2026-08-18 finance/maple cleanup, lh3.googleusercontent.com
+ *    /J6_coFbogxh...) is ALWAYS blocked, in every variant (resize suffixes,
+ *    host rotation lh2/lh3/lh4, case, extra query strings)
+ *  - real publisher article photos on googleusercontent-lookalike or normal
+ *    publisher hosts are NEVER blocked (must-pass: false positives here
+ *    would strip legitimate images)
+ *
+ * Runner: `tsx tests/image-guard.test.ts` -> exit 1 on failure.
+ */
+import assert from 'node:assert/strict';
+
+import { isPlaceholderImage } from '@/lib/ingest/image-guard';
+
+let passed = 0;
+let failed = 0;
+
+function check(name: string, fn: () => void): void {
+  try {
+    fn();
+    passed += 1;
+    console.log(`ok ${passed} - ${name}`);
+  } catch (e) {
+    failed += 1;
+    console.error(`not ok ${passed + failed} - ${name}`);
+    console.error(String((e as Error).stack ?? e));
+  }
+}
+
+// The exact shared tile URL stored on 601 production rows (2026-08-18).
+const TILE =
+  'https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/J6_coFbogxhRI9iM864NL_liGXvsQp2Aups' +
+  'Kei7z0cNNfDvGUmWUy20nuUhkREQyrpY4bEeIBuc=s0-w300';
+
+check('MUST-BLOCK: exact prod shared tile url', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(TILE).blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: -rw resize variant', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(`${TILE}-rw`).blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: lh4 host rotation', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/xyz123=s900').blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: lh2 host rotation', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('https://lh2.googleusercontent.com/xyz123').blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: uppercase host', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('https://LH3.GOOGLEUSERCONTENT.COM/J6_coFbo=s0').blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: extra query string / fragment', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(TILE + '&dummy=1#f').blocked, true);
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: unknown key (not the known tile) still blocked by host rule', () => {
+  assert.equal(
+    isPlaceholderImage('https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/someOtherKeyWq9aB=s64').blocked,
+    true,
+  );
+});
+check('MUST-BLOCK: whitespace-wrapped url', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(`  ${TILE}  `).blocked, true);
+});
+
+check('MUST-PASS: wired photo (publisher CDN)', () => {
+  assert.equal(
+    isPlaceholderImage('https://media.wired.com/photos/6a84a2c1/191:100/w_1280/c_limit/x.jpg').blocked,
+    false,
+  );
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: cnbcfm photo (publisher CDN)', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('https://media.cnbcfm.com/i/2026/08/robo.jpg').blocked, false);
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: google.com logo asset (NOT googleusercontent)', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('https://www.google.com/logos/2026/xx512.png').blocked, false);
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: example.com path segment merely containing the host string', () => {
+  assert.equal(
+    isPlaceholderImage('https://cdn.example.com/googleusercontent.com/img.png').blocked,
+    false,
+  );
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: null', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(null).blocked, false);
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: undefined', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage(undefined).blocked, false);
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: empty string', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('').blocked, false);
+});
+check('MUST-PASS: not a URL', () => {
+  assert.equal(isPlaceholderImage('not a url').blocked, false);
+});
+
+console.log(`\nimage-guard: ${passed} passed, ${failed} failed`);
+if (failed > 0) process.exit(1);

tests/image-proxy.test.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,143 @@
+/**
+ * Image-proxy helper tests (offline — no network).
+ *
+ * Contract under test:
+ *  - sniffImage: magic-byte → Content-Type for jpeg/png/gif/webp/avif/heic/bmp,
+ *    null for HTML blockpages and junk (a hotlink guard returning 200 HTML
+ *    must never be served as an image).
+ *  - isSafeProxyTarget: public http(s) only — no loopback, RFC1918, link-local,
+ *    IPv6 private, or non-web schemes; our own site origin rejected.
+ *  - proxyImageUrl: remote http(s) → /images?url=... ; relative / data: /
+ *    our-own-origin URLs pass through untouched.
+ *
+ * Runner: `tsx tests/image-proxy.test.ts` → TAP-style, exit 1 on failure.
+ */
+import assert from 'node:assert/strict';
+
+process.env.NEXT_PUBLIC_SITE_URL = 'https://technews.krisforbes.ca';
+
+import {
+  isSafeProxyTarget,
+  proxyImageUrl,
+  isPrivateHost,
+} from '@/lib/image-mapping';
+import { mediaKey, sniffImage } from '@/lib/images';
+
+let passed = 0;
+let failed = 0;
+
+function check(name: string, fn: () => void): void {
+  try {
+    fn();
+    passed += 1;
+    console.log(`ok ${passed + failed} ${name}`);
+  } catch (err) {
+    failed += 1;
+    console.log(`not ok ${passed + failed} ${name}`);
+    console.log(`  ${(err as Error).message}`);
+  }
+}
+
+const b = (b64: string) => Buffer.from(b64, 'base64');
+// Minimal valid magic headers (payload irrelevant to the sniff).
+const JPEG = b(
+  '/9j/4AAQSkZJRgABAQAAAQABAAD/2wBDAAMCAgMCAgMDAwMEAwMEBQgFBQQEBQoHBwYIDAoKBwYKDwMNDhgMEggRCwUNDAwTFBMSFBQUFxQVFRUUgAFMAAQHBgMCAwYHBgcKEA0HCAkKDw0NDhERCg0RHREKCA8VEg0RERoNDAwQGiYNDg8VIRUQNBMfISEYGRM0KhwjGhs0MioaIxwkIhgY',
+);
+const PNG = b('iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAEAAAABCAYAAAAfFcSJAAAACklEQVR4nGMYAQCABQAB6V282gAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==');
+const WEBP = b('UklGRlQAAABXRUJQVlA4IBoAAAAwAQCdASoBAAEAAUAmJaQAA3AA/vuUAAA=');
+const AVIF = Buffer.concat([Buffer.alloc(4), Buffer.from('ftypavif', 'ascii')]);
+const GIF = b('R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP///wAAACH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAICRAEAOw==');
+const HTML = Buffer.from('<!doctype html><html><body><h1>Access Denied</h1><p>The referenced entity does not exist</p>');
+
+check('sniff: jpeg magic → image/jpeg', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(JPEG), 'image/jpeg');
+});
+check('sniff: png magic → image/png', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(PNG), 'image/png');
+});
+check('sniff: webp magic → image/webp', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(WEBP), 'image/webp');
+});
+check('sniff: avif ftyp → image/avif', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(AVIF), 'image/avif');
+});
+check('sniff: gif magic → image/gif', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(GIF), 'image/gif');
+});
+check('sniff: HTML blockpage → null', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(HTML), null);
+});
+check('sniff: short/garbage buffer → null', () => {
+  assert.equal(sniffImage(Buffer.from('ab')), null);
+});
+
+check('ssrf: public https ok', () => {
+  assert.ok(isSafeProxyTarget('https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/ace/branded_news/x.jpg'));
+});
+check('ssrf: public http ok', () => {
+  assert.ok(isSafeProxyTarget('http://example.com/a.webp'));
+});
+check('ssrf: localhost blocked', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://localhost:3000/images?url=x'));
+});
+check('ssrf: 127/10/192.168/169.254 blocked', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://127.0.0.1/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://10.0.0.5/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://192.168.1.2/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://169.254.169.254/latest'));
+});
+check('ssrf: 172.16-31 blocked, 172.15/172.32 ok', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://172.17.0.1:11434/'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://172.16.0.9/'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://172.31.9.9/'));
+  assert.ok(isSafeProxyTarget('http://172.15.255.1/')); // below private range
+  assert.ok(isSafeProxyTarget('http://172.32.0.1/')); // above private range
+});
+check('ssrf: ipv6 loopback/link-local/ULA blocked, mapped private blocked', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[::1]/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[fe80::1]/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[fd00::1]/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[::ffff:127.0.0.1]/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[::ffff:192.168.1.2]/a'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('http://[::]/a'));
+});
+check('ssrf: non-web schemes blocked', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('file:///etc/passwd'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('gopher://example.com'));
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('blob:https://x.com/abc'));
+});
+check('ssrf: our own origin rejected (no self-proxy)', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('https://technews.krisforbes.ca/article/x'));
+});
+check('ssrf: unparseable url → false', () => {
+  assert.ok(!isSafeProxyTarget('not a url'));
+});
+
+check('proxy: remote url → /images?url=...', () => {
+  const u = 'https://data-api.investing.com/trkd-images/abc.jpg';
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl(u), `/images?url=${encodeURIComponent(u)}`);
+});
+check('proxy: relative path passes through', () => {
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl('/covers/tech.svg'), null);
+});
+check('proxy: data URI passes through', () => {
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl('data:image/png;base64,AAA='), null);
+});
+check('proxy: own-origin url passes through', () => {
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl('https://technews.krisforbes.ca/logo.png'), null);
+});
+check('proxy: empty/blank → null', () => {
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl(null), null);
+  assert.equal(proxyImageUrl('   '), null);
+});
+check('key: stable + 40 hex chars', () => {
+  const k1 = mediaKey('https://x.com/a.jpg');
+  const k2 = mediaKey('https://x.com/a.jpg');
+  assert.equal(k1, k2);
+  assert.match(k1, /^[0-9a-f]{40}$/);
+  assert.notEqual(k1, mediaKey('https://x.com/b.jpg'));
+});
+
+const total = passed + failed;
+console.log(`\n# tests ${total}, pass ${passed}, fail ${failed}`);
+process.exit(failed === 0 ? 0 : 1);