It does prevent a regular user from doing it. However, In 10 years I've not seen a single user past a link into a message of the results of a image search. No, you would not have figured it out on your own, that's why I told you.

In general, the new code exposes URLs that often cannot be used in messages. This is no different than the old code. It was impossible to link to a specific page in the listing of image tumbs in the old code.

For example, a link to page 2 of a list of images on ocean pines forum would end up looking like "/OceanPines/Images/1#2/?R=Y" in a message. It works, but the user is taken to page 1, not page 2. The #2 indicates page 2 in the url, but it is an ajax-call to page 2, with ajax calls speeding up page loads. It is a tradeoff. I could dump the ajax calls and slow down page loading, write a slew of convoluted code to automatically correct a url pasted into messages -- all to satisfy one or two message posts every few years--, or leave it as is. For now, I'm going with the latter.

Meantime, for the example above, changing the url in the html code to "/OceanPines/Images/2/?R=Y" makes the link work properly.

Finally, the most important links -- those to specific images or specific features work right out of the box if copied and pasted into messages.