17 replies
Hey guys,

I just had a problem that I thought you should be aware of because it could be happening to you and you won't even know it.

I recently started a small niche site that will rank in the SE's, so I found a theme, blah blah ya know, the usual WP set up.

But after I installed my theme, I found that when I viewed the source of my page I had links to some spam sites that were totally hidden! I scoured the theme files and couldn't find for the life of me where they were coming from.

They had this tag on them:
<div style="visibility:hidden; display:none">

So I finally figured it out and found that when I installed the theme it changed my general-template.php file.

So anyway, if you're using some sort of free theme you found somewhere on the web, I would highly recommend checking the source of your page to make sure there are no hidden spam links in there.

I'm not sure if Google penalizes for such a thing, but even if they don't I'm not going to help some spammer...and you shouldn't either!

If Goog does penalize for this though it's definitely something to get fixed right away, so check now!
#dangerous #themes
  • Profile picture of the author JonMills
    Oh yeah always look in the code if you have downloaded it from a site, as there are some crafty gifts who want free traffic
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  • Profile picture of the author Gail Sober
    That's one way. Some use encoded javascript in the footer.php and others, the Flexibility2 theme for example hides links in the sidebar.php to only display on certain pages.

    Always best to take a quick peek in all the files before using.
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  • Profile picture of the author jasonmorgan
    Stick with themes you get from wordpress directly or a reputable source. Avoid all of those free WP theme sites, most of them are exactly what you found, clever IMers using them to spread their backlinks.
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    • Profile picture of the author Carl Donovan
      Originally Posted by jasonmorgan View Post

      most of them are... clever IMers using them to spread their backlinks.
      Isn't that what all of us are doing? Personally, I see no danger in someone scoring backlinks by giving me a free theme, as long as the anchor is hidden.

      Each and every successful IMer is doing everything in his or her power to find ways to get in an extra backlink or ten.

      This one sounds like a hell of a clever idea to me!
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      • Profile picture of the author TinkBD
        Thanks for the warning.

        This is just one of the reasons I merit my Artisteer purchase as one of my best investments. ;-)
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      • Profile picture of the author Bill Farnham
        Originally Posted by Quarl421 View Post

        Isn't that what all of us are doing? Personally, I see no danger in someone scoring backlinks by giving me a free theme, as long as the anchor is hidden.

        Each and every successful IMer is doing everything in his or her power to find ways to get in an extra backlink or ten.

        This one sounds like a hell of a clever idea to me!
        Nope, not all of us. Your definition of clever is certainly different than mine...

        ~Bill
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        • Profile picture of the author Tyson Faulkner
          I like the idea of keeping the footer links in for the designers. That way people can see their work and I give them a little link juice for their work. But sneaking links in that I am not even aware of is spammy and devious, I wouldn't consider that clever, especially when it changes a file on my site that makes those links permanent, whether or not I'm using their theme.
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      • Profile picture of the author Gail_Curran
        Originally Posted by Quarl421 View Post

        Isn't that what all of us are doing? Personally, I see no danger in someone scoring backlinks by giving me a free theme, as long as the anchor is hidden.

        Each and every successful IMer is doing everything in his or her power to find ways to get in an extra backlink or ten.

        This one sounds like a hell of a clever idea to me!
        I don't have a problem with giving the designer a legit backlink. But these backlinks are coming from people who take other people's free themes and add their own hidden links.
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  • Profile picture of the author MrSaws
    Great information, thanks. Will take a look at all my themes now. :p
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    • Profile picture of the author Tyson Faulkner
      If you find out you do have this problem, be careful who you blame it on =)

      I was convinced that my current theme was the problem for a bit, but after I fixed the problem I found out that it was an earlier theme that I just installed to see how it looked.

      So it wasn't actually the theme I was using, keep that in mind.
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  • Profile picture of the author marica theuma
    Great info, especially if you've just started using themes! Would anybody please be a bit more specific for what type of codes to look for in your wordpress and where, for the non-techies?

    Thanks!

    marica
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    • Profile picture of the author Tyson Faulkner
      If you go to your home page and go up to View >> Page Source.

      Then once that comes up go to Edit >> Find and type this into the find box:
      visibility:hidden; OR
      display:none

      Then firefox will search through the page and see if that code is anywhere on it. If it is, you probably have some hidden links on the page.
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      • Profile picture of the author CiroColonna
        Originally Posted by Tyson Faulkner View Post

        If you go to your home page and go up to View >> Page Source.

        Then once that comes up go to Edit >> Find and type this into the find box:
        visibility:hidden; OR
        display:none

        Then firefox will search through the page and see if that code is anywhere on it. If it is, you probably have some hidden links on the page.
        Viewing the source in your browser is not bulletproof as the programmer could have decided to include his links only when such or such condition is met. In other words, because you don't see it now doesn't mean that it's not there. The only way to know for sure that nothing malicious is hidden in your theme is to look at the source files.
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  • Profile picture of the author Matthew Shelton
    I'd like to see a WSO on removing this kind of stuff from wordpress themes, including all the links left by companies on themes that you paid for
    - it is more techie than most people want to get into.
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    • Profile picture of the author Rikki_Fawkes
      The first thing I do when I download a WP theme is look through it for outbound sites - especially the ones in the footer. Once I found a WP theme with a whole set of commercial sites near the copyright - those were the first things to go.
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  • Profile picture of the author cashcow
    When I used to use free themes, I noticed that a lot of times keeping the links in is part of the terms of using the theme.

    In fact, I found very few nice looking free themes that allowed you to remove the links (or didn't have any to begin with).

    So be sure to check on that before you remove any links.

    There's not very many things in life that really are "free".

    Lee
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