Detect Click into Iframe using JavaScript

Question

I understand that it is not possible to tell what the user is doing inside an iframe if it is cross domain. What I would like to do is track if the user clicked at all in the iframe. I imagine a scenario where there is an invisible div on top of the iframe and the the div will just then pass the click event to the iframe.

Is something like this possible? If it is, then how would I go about it? The iframes are ads, so I have no control over the tags that are used.

Answer 1

You can achieve this by using the blur event on window element.

Here is a jQuery plugin for tracking click on iframes (it will fire a custom callback function when an iframe is clicked) : https://github.com/finalclap/iframeTracker-jquery

Use it like this :

jQuery(document).ready(function($){
    $('.iframe_wrap iframe').iframeTracker({
        blurCallback: function(){
            // Do something when iframe is clicked (like firing an XHR request)
        }
    });
});

Answer 2

http://jsfiddle.net/QcAee/406/

Just make a invisible layer over the iframe that go back when click and go up when mouseleave event will be fired !!
Need jQuery

this solution don't propagate first click inside iframe!

$("#invisible_layer").on("click",function(){
		alert("click");
		$("#invisible_layer").css("z-index",-11);

});
$("iframe").on("mouseleave",function(){
		$("#invisible_layer").css("z-index",11);
});

iframe {
    width: 500px;
    height: 300px;
}
#invisible_layer{
  position: absolute;
  background-color:trasparent;
  width: 500px;
  height:300px;
}

<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
<div id="message"></div>
<div id="invisible_layer">

</div>
<iframe id="iframe" src="//example.com"></iframe>

Answer 3

This is small solution that works in all browsers even IE8:

var monitor = setInterval(function(){
    var elem = document.activeElement;
    if(elem && elem.tagName == 'IFRAME'){
        clearInterval(monitor);
        alert('clicked!');
    }
}, 100);

You can test it here: http://jsfiddle.net/oqjgzsm0/

Answer 4

Here is solution using suggested approaches with hover+blur and active element tricks, not any libraries, just pure js. Works fine for FF/Chrome. Mostly approache is same as @Mohammed Radwan proposed, except that I use different method proposed by @zone117x to track iframe click for FF, because window.focus is not working without addition user settings:

Makes a request to bring the window to the front. It may fail due to user settings and the window isn't guaranteed to be frontmost before this method returns.

Here is compound method:

function () {
    const state = {};

    (function (setup) {
        if (typeof window.addEventListener !== 'undefined') {
            window.addEventListener('load', setup, false);
        } else if (typeof document.addEventListener !== 'undefined') {
            document.addEventListener('load', setup, false);
        } else if (typeof window.attachEvent !== 'undefined') {
            window.attachEvent('onload', setup);
        } else {
            if (typeof window.onload === 'function') {
                const oldonload = onload;
                window.onload = function () {
                    oldonload();
                    setup();
                };
            } else {
                window.onload = setup;
            }
        }
    })(function () {
        state.isOverIFrame = false;
        state.firstBlur = false;
        state.hasFocusAcquired = false;

        findIFramesAndBindListeners();

        document.body.addEventListener('click', onClick);

        if (typeof window.attachEvent !== 'undefined') {
            top.attachEvent('onblur', function () {
                state.firstBlur = true;
                state.hasFocusAcquired = false;
                onIFrameClick()
            });
            top.attachEvent('onfocus', function () {
                state.hasFocusAcquired = true;
                console.log('attachEvent.focus');
            });
        } else if (typeof window.addEventListener !== 'undefined') {
            top.addEventListener('blur', function () {
                state.firstBlur = true;
                state.hasFocusAcquired = false;
                onIFrameClick();
            }, false);
            top.addEventListener('focus', function () {
                state.hasFocusAcquired = true;
                console.log('addEventListener.focus');
            });
        }

        setInterval(findIFramesAndBindListeners, 500);
    });

    function isFF() {
        return navigator.userAgent.search(/firefox/i) !== -1;
    }

    function isActiveElementChanged() {
        const prevActiveTag = document.activeElement.tagName.toUpperCase();
        document.activeElement.blur();
        const currActiveTag = document.activeElement.tagName.toUpperCase();
        return !prevActiveTag.includes('BODY') && currActiveTag.includes('BODY');
    }

    function onMouseOut() {
        if (!state.firstBlur && isFF() && isActiveElementChanged()) {
            console.log('firefox first click');
            onClick();
        } else {
            document.activeElement.blur();
            top.focus();
        }
        state.isOverIFrame = false;
        console.log(`onMouseOut`);
    }

    function onMouseOver() {
        state.isOverIFrame = true;
        console.log(`onMouseOver`);
    }

    function onIFrameClick() {
        console.log(`onIFrameClick`);
        if (state.isOverIFrame) {
            onClick();
        }
    }

    function onClick() {
        console.log(`onClick`);
    }

    function findIFramesAndBindListeners() {
        return Array.from(document.getElementsByTagName('iframe'))
            .forEach(function (element) {
                element.onmouseover = onMouseOver;
                element.onmouseout = onMouseOut;
            });
    }
}

Answer 5

Is something like this possible?

No. All you can do is detect the mouse going into the iframe, and potentially (though not reliably) when it comes back out (ie. trying to work out the difference between the pointer passing over the ad on its way somewhere else versus lingering on the ad).

I imagine a scenario where there is an invisible div on top of the iframe and the the div will just then pass the click event to the iframe.

Nope, there is no way to fake a click event.

By catching the mousedown you'd prevent the original click from getting to the iframe. If you could determine when the mouse button was about to be pressed you could try to get the invisible div out of the way so that the click would go through... but there is also no event that fires just before a mousedown.

You could try to guess, for example by looking to see if the pointer has come to rest, guessing a click might be about to come. But it's totally unreliable, and if you fail you've just lost yourself a click-through.

Answer 6

Just found this solution... I tried it, I loved it..

Works for cross domain iframes for desktop and mobile!

Don't know if it is foolproof yet

window.addEventListener('blur',function(){
      if(document.activeElement.id == 'CrossDomainiframeId'){
        //do something :-)
      }
});

Happy coding