Black Hat and Grey Hat

14 years ago

Originally Posted by jamescoa

Hi, I'm new in Internet Marketing. Could anybody please tell me what is the difference between Black Hat and Grey Hat?

Thanks

As I see it, pure Black Hat marketing is like knocking over a liquor store. It's against the law, the robber knows it, and does it anyway.

Grey Hat would be more akin to grazing your way through the bulk candy aisle at the store, "sampling" until you get your sugar fix.

I won't try to get into specific marketing examples because it just brings out the forum lawyers who want to pick at anything for exceptions and loopholes.

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jamescoa

14 years ago

Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe

As I see it, pure Black Hat marketing is like knocking over a liquor store. It's against the law, the robber knows it, and does it anyway.

Grey Hat would be more akin to grazing your way through the bulk candy aisle at the store, "sampling" until you get your sugar fix.

I won't try to get into specific marketing examples because it just brings out the forum lawyers who want to pick at anything for exceptions and loopholes.

Thanks for your answer. I don't want to involve in a business that is Illegal and against law. So, I want to build my basic about what I can and can't do in Internet Marketing.

Did you know where can I get any reference for this thing?

Thanks
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JohnMcCabe

14 years ago

Originally Posted by jamescoa

Thanks for your answer. I don't want to involve in a business that is Illegal and against law. So, I want to build my basic about what I can and can't do in Internet Marketing.

Did you know where can I get any reference for this thing?

One of the characteristics of both grey hat and black hat tactics is that they break the rules of the resource they are using.

Like using a naked affiliate link in your sig file here. (That's a hint, by the way. Check the rules for this forum, and you'll see affiliate links are not allowed.)

Here's a concrete example...

Black Hat: You find an article on a directory or other site. You copy that article word for word, maybe even the formatting. You change the author's name to yours, and the links to your own.

Dark Grey Hat: You find an article as before. After copying it, you go through and change things, substituting words and the like until you pass some arbitrary uniqueness percentage. Then you add your name as the author and put in your own links.

Lighter Grey Hat: You find a handful of articles as above. You take one paragraph from each, tweak the wording a bit, and post it as your own.

White Hat: You read several articles on a given subject, digest them, and write one original article using what you learned from your reading.

Operating a business as a pure white hat is damn near impossible. Even the Lone Ranger's Stetson was beige. Follow your gut and do what feels right, and you'll be right most of the time. If you're caught out doing something bad, even by mistake, own up to it, fix it and move on. You should do fine.

Just being concerned about doing things the right way is a good start...

Thanks
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jamescoa

14 years ago

Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe

One of the characteristics of both grey hat and black hat tactics is that they break the rules of the resource they are using.

Like using a naked affiliate link in your sig file here. (That's a hint, by the way. Check the rules for this forum, and you'll see affiliate links are not allowed.)

Here's a concrete example...

Black Hat: You find an article on a directory or other site. You copy that article word for word, maybe even the formatting. You change the author's name to yours, and the links to your own.

Dark Grey Hat: You find an article as before. After copying it, you go through and change things, substituting words and the like until you pass some arbitrary uniqueness percentage. Then you add your name as the author and put in your own links.

Lighter Grey Hat: You find a handful of articles as above. You take one paragraph from each, tweak the wording a bit, and post it as your own.

White Hat: You read several articles on a given subject, digest them, and write one original article using what you learned from your reading.

Operating a business as a pure white hat is damn near impossible. Even the Lone Ranger's Stetson was beige. Follow your gut and do what feels right, and you'll be right most of the time. If you're caught out doing something bad, even by mistake, own up to it, fix it and move on. You should do fine.

Just being concerned about doing things the right way is a good start...

This is a very helpful example. Thanks for helping me and thanks for remind me of my signature. I'll remove it before I get into trouble

Thanks

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IndigoJack

14 years ago

Black Hat is dirty, White Hat is clean & Grey Hat is the murk in between.

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lucio101

Banned 14 years ago

[DELETED]

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FiveMe

14 years ago

Originally Posted by lucio101

You can't get here knowledge about BlueFart or Greyhat.Please delete this thread or you will be banned.

What high horse did you come riding in? He was asking a simple question and the question has been answered. Maybe you should look at getting your eyes checked or better yet, think before you write.

Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe

As I see it, pure Black Hat marketing is like knocking over a liquor store. It's against the law, the robber knows it, and does it anyway.

Grey Hat would be more akin to grazing your way through the bulk candy aisle at the store, "sampling" until you get your sugar fix.

I won't try to get into specific marketing examples because it just brings out the forum lawyers who want to pick at anything for exceptions and loopholes.

This is a great analogy of the terms.

To the OP, Neither are truly worth it as you will lose before you even start. In my opinion, focus on building a business based on what you are offering the legit way so that way you never worry about losing money. I can assure you, using black hat ways, you'll get penalized quite fast.

John says it best, until you get your fix.. Ah the days of young when we would try the saltwater taffy.

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John Durham

14 years ago

Black hat means you dont have a conscious about destroying other peoples hard work.

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DogScout 14 years ago

Originally Posted by John Durham

Black hat means you dont have a conscious about destroying other peoples hard work.

or attempting to trick clients and/orsearch engines. (though back-linking is openly discussed and is technically 'gaming' search engine algorithms, but even large corporations do it.)
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Chris Worner

14 years ago

To the OP,

you are asking a very tough question, truth be told it is subjective and really dependent on ones own opinion. Black hat/grey hat etc often get thrown around a lot making it very tricky to define. Black hat used to mean gaming the search engines, but nowadays, depending who you ask, it can also include using automation tools as well, no matter if it is a simple article submitter(believe it or not)

Even outsourcing your work to VA's could be argued as black hat.

Chris

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jamescoa

14 years ago

Originally Posted by Chris Kent

B lack hat means contravening terms and conditions of the sites that you use, minimum. It can also be unethical but isn't always so. It can even be illegal but isn't usually so, it does not usually involve outright conning of people for money. B'hat often involves deception and/or wasting of people's times.

Grey hat contravenes terms and conditions of a site. It is similar to black hat but is less unethical. More people do it, even those who take a stance against b'hat. The classic example of grey hat is forum profile backlinking. A waste of the internet's resources but absolutely rife, even among marketers who call themselves white hat.

So, how about trading links or exchange link one to another? Can we described this as Black one or Grey One?

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JohnMcCabe

14 years ago

Originally Posted by jamescoa

So, how about trading links or exchange link one to another? Can we described this as Black one or Grey One?

This is one of the grey areas, and a lot depends on implied intent. Why are you trading links?

Is it to game the search results?

Or is it to provide useful content to your visitors, and pick up some link love along the way?

Thanks
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jamescoa

14 years ago

Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe

This is one of the grey areas, and a lot depends on implied intent. Why are you trading links?

Is it to game the search results?

Or is it to provide useful content to your visitors, and pick up some link love along the way?

I would agree that trading links is to game the search results. I ever hear that it can boost up SEO in our website. Yet, I'm never used it.

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tpw 14 years ago

Originally Posted by jamescoa

I would agree that trading links is to game the search results. I ever hear that it can boost up SEO in our website. Yet, I'm never used it.

"Illegal" is very subjective on this matter...

When we are talking about gaming the search engines, it usually requires for you to break the TOS of a given website...

For example, including affiliate links in your sig at WF is against its TOS, so that would make that kind of activity black hat if you find some way to circumvent the rule...

Often times, we are talking about the violation of TOS at a specific website, in order to game Google...

Other times, we are talking about the violation of the Google TOS...

When gaming the search engines, black hat is not technically illegal, but definitely falls under the guise of stealing from the resources of an online entity, which is clearly wrong and immoral...

Most often when people talk about black hat in the forums, they will be talking about how to game Google...

But there is also another face to black hat...

This often involves tricking people to help you make money... This is not only a violation of the TOS of most affiliate networks and CPA networks, but it also falls under deceptive advertising, regulated by the FTC...

I saw a clear case of black hat consumer deception last night in my email...

Someone sent me an email "about the car listing I put on Craigslist"... Deception #1, I do have an ad on CL, but it was not even in the automotive section... Deception #2, they suggested that "they" wanted me to check this website and verify that the website was offering auto insurance rates at 50% discounts, from all other competitors... LOL They were trying to deceive me to get me to bite their CPA offer...

In other cases, black hat is pure theft of resources or revenues...

In the first case, it is just wrong... In the second case, it is illegal in a civil sense if you get caught... In the third, it is outright fraud...
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Mcrofts

14 years ago

lol I was Going to Give Example's, then Deleted What I wrote & thought Best not.

Grey Hat> Building Massive Links Wheel's, of Multiple Blog's Secretly Linked around together, Making a Fake Alias on a Site (PenName)
A Grey Hat is Really When you Research or are Aware of Black Hat Technique's, & your Goal is Really for Security & is Good.
Grey hat - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Black Hat> Sending Email's without Permission(Spam)
> Pretending to be a Pretty young girl & getting Guys to sign up to some ADult Dating Site.
> Mass Spamming Forum's With your Website Link
> Creating Multiple Adsense Account's with Google Would be BlueFart
> Alot of Black Hat Techniques are for FAST money, but not Sustainable or Long Lived, once there caught out, it falls apart.
>There's Many Other thing's, But you should get the Idea

> Having No Moral's, When it Comes to how you Make Money Online..

Outsourcing in no way Shape or Form is Black Hat, are you serious haha
Your Paying Someone an Income to work for you, if you pay a Filipino $200 a Month, thats more than they would make as a Nurse or Builder or Salesmen even, in the Philippines.

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MISsupport 14 years ago

My IM mentor came from the BH world but decided to stop doing that. Like he told us: "I build 100s a day but had to restart the morning after because, yes it made me money, but they were also deindexed after 24 hours or less more often than none. I wanted more stability for my family"

So, he teaches us more White/Grey(a little) because he don't want us to stress each day about our sites like he did.

Most people do Grey hat SEO because every time you get a backlink to your site that's not from a directory, it's against Google TOS. Many will use automated

tpw has many good examples on the level and much darker side. Btw, thanks.

falls under deceptive advertising

I think many big IMers are falling in this category recently with their so-called "limited copies" that are not
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- halfpoint 14 years ago
  
  The definitions of Black Hat, Grey Hat and White Hat are subjective. As such, there is no definitive answer to what each means.
  
  In regards to SEO, I do plenty of things on here that might be considered grey/black hat by some.
  
  Then again, if you asked Matt Cutts, anybody who so much as submits an article to Ezine Articles for the purpose of a backlink is acting in a Black Hat manner.
  
  As I said, it's open to interpretation and if you were to ask 100 people you'd probably get 100 different answers.
  
  Thanks
  
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Black Hat and Grey Hat

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