GitHub and Gist provide a "raw" view feature that allows users to see files in their original text format instead of the rendered version on the website, which is useful for copying or viewing Markdown files without rendering. However, this feature has been exploited by computers for "hotlinking," where raw URLs are used as sources for scripts or images, causing performance issues as these views require rendering like any other Rails app view. To combat this, GitHub added the X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff header to raw URL responses in 2011, which forces browsers to adhere to the Content-Type header, preventing them from treating text files as JavaScript or CSS. While initially only effective in Internet Explorer, recent adoption by Google and Mozilla means that Chrome and Firefox will also support this header, reducing hotlinking in these browsers.