How would you explain white hat and black hat?

16 years ago

White hat = legal
Black hat = illegal
Grey hat = inbetween / on the edge.

I'm pretty sure that's the distinction in a nutshell.

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rseobeginner 16 years ago

Originally Posted by WillR

White hat = legal
Black hat = illegal
Grey hat = inbetween / on the edge.

I'm pretty sure that's the distinction in a nutshell.

If you use black hack what will be the positive effect to a site? and how about negative effect?
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imarketed93874

Banned 16 years ago

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WillR 16 years ago

Originally Posted by imarketed93874

Black hat is when you automate long, boring, repetitive tasks such as following people on Twitter.

That can be both black AND white hat.
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bizman413

16 years ago

I could be wrong here, but sometimes I heard blackhat referred to as more "sneaky". Don't know if it's especially illegal. Because it seems like there was a big name marketer who did a little black hat marketing. Maybe I'm getting him mixed up with another guy, or what I'm referring to is gray

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webapex

16 years ago

Take Care: Discussions of Blk Hat techniques have been officially banned from Warriorforum and is known here as blue fart.

Some search engines cheats are, I believe considered Blk Hat, like generating farms of sites with scraped content just for seo purposes, these only violate Google guidelines, some cross over the line into illegal activities without stopping to consider the implications. Creating multiple craiglist accounts is a common Blk Hat activity, violates their TOS, which mention a per violation charge that might be rendered, lawsuits have been filed against some wholesale Craiglist posting services.

One case, that was at one time not clearly defined as a criminal activity that made the news:
"Digital Point owners indicted for cookie stuffing"

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Gail Sober

16 years ago

Illegal vs legal is dictated by law and is pretty black and white

BH is something that usually gets immediate results opposed to long term but will more than likely result in your termination from a website/hosting account/affiliate program if caught. IMO

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Thomas Michal

16 years ago

Uhh, Sorry folks but BH isn't illegal...

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PPC-Coach

16 years ago

White hat means you'll actually get paid all the commissions you earned.

Black hat means you risk all the commissions you earned, you might get paid if they don't catch what you're doing.

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Thomas Michal

16 years ago

Originally Posted by PPC-Coach

White hat means you'll actually get paid all the commissions you earned.

Black hat means you risk all the commissions you earned, you might get paid if they don't catch what you're doing.

Although there are some networks that really only worry about the bottom line, and to say someone didn't work for their commission is a little harsh.

Just because someone takes shortcuts doesn't mean they didn't work.

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Marvin Johnston

16 years ago

Another way to look at White Hat/Black Hat is in terms of the search engines/affiliates/etc. Black Hat is not generally illegal in terms of the law, but rather not complying with the terms and conditions of the search engines and/or whoever you are promoting. White Hat is just abiding by the terms and conditions of whatever service you are using.

Marvin

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kaiserthesage

16 years ago

White hat - time consuming but long term
Black hat - easy but short term

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Matt Morgan

16 years ago

Originally Posted by BradRich

How would you guys explain white hat and black hat and which is more popular with successful internet marketers?

A white hat is white,

A black hat is black, and contains a rabbit if owned by a magician

Couldn't resist.

Anyway, Internet marketing White hat methods usually take longer than black hat, but the efforts can pay of with a boatload of long term traffic.

You should avoid black tactics, as the search engines etc find found out you have been doing it, your efforts could go to waste.

They are a lot smarter than you thing.

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yukon

Banned 16 years ago

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orvn 16 years ago

Originally Posted by yukon

What law, the internet law?

The Jedi Code of course!

Originally Posted by yukon

Lol, at all the varied opinions.

I know, right!
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dadamson

16 years ago

White Hat is when you do SEO with a white hat on.

Black Hat is when you do SEO with a black hat on.

BlueFart is, well...

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bradlean

16 years ago

White hat means the ethical way.

Black hat means the non-ethical way.

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corsleymaxwell 16 years ago

That White Hat Techniques are ethical whereas Black Hat Techniques are not
That Black Hat Techniques are probably illegal, and that there is a slight chance that White Hat techniques are illegal too!
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orvn

16 years ago

It's really all a matter of taste.

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BradRich

16 years ago

I am trying to figure out the hat and fart thing... I saw a post that said black hat is where the money is. I really don't know anything about what techniques = black or white or grey or blue. I just assumed that black hat was illegal stuff but not sure how you can do stuff like that anyway. I'm just trying to get to the bottom of the "hat" techniques to know whats what. Thanks to everyone for all the posts. Keep them coming if possible. I see this has been moved to the seo forum, so I guess the black and white hat have to do with getting traffic? Like legal ways to get traffic and not so legal ways to get traffic?

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orvn

16 years ago

Originally Posted by BradRich

I am trying to figure out the hat and fart thing... I saw a post that said black hat is where the money is. I really don't know anything about what techniques = black or white or grey or blue. I just assumed that black hat was illegal stuff but not sure how you can do stuff like that anyway. I'm just trying to get to the bottom of the "hat" techniques to know whats what. Thanks to everyone for all the posts. Keep them coming if possible. I see this has been moved to the seo forum, so I guess the black and white hat have to do with getting traffic? Like legal ways to get traffic and not so legal ways to get traffic?

Alright Brad.
I'll tell you all about hats.

Let's start with this: it has nothing to do with legality. It's more to do with what Google likes and what it doesn't.

As you have gathered, there isn't a clear definition but:

A White hat technique is an SEO tactic that Google would encourage and support.
A Black hat technique typically (but not necessarily) takes advantage of sneaky programming practices. Google does not endorse these.

WHITE HAT example:
I write a bunch of articles and put them on sites like Squidoo and Hubpages, linking to eachother and my site, using my keyword as anchor text.

BLACK HAT example:
I write a clever script that I put it in a Wordpress plug-in and wait for people to download it. When they install the extension, it creates a backlink to my site.

So in this case, the black hat technique is clearly unethical and malicious.

But what about this example?

I have gathered several websites and created a 4-way link wheel between us for hundreds of links.

This doesn't seem directly malicious at all and many people practice this. However, Google does not endorse it. Google has strategies to locate abuse like this, but the fact is that if you make the wheel large enough, it won't be able to do anything about it.
Arguably, link-wheeling can be called GREY HAT.

I have created 300 backlinks and made an RSS feed out of them. I send this feed to Google and the crawler knows to index them.

Google doesn't like having stuff like this forced upon it, but it doesn't know if you're doing something legitimate or not. This could just be an authority account on a specific topic from del.icio.us or something.
Again, this is arguably GREY HAT.

BLUE FART = BLACK HAT. That's just the censor on this forum.

Black hat stuff will get you in trouble, but only if you mess up. If you're a talented programmer and you've thought of a sneaky little trick, I would, most of the time, encourage it.

Black hat doesn't have to be unethical, but it often is.
Black hat is only bad if you suck at it.

RED HAT is a linux operating system.

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superSEO2011 16 years ago

Originally Posted by dadamson

White Hat is when you do SEO with a white hat on.

Black Hat is when you do SEO with a black hat on.

BlueFart is, well...

Ha ha ha ha!
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- Andrew22 16 years ago
  
  White Hat=All The Ethical Techniques
  Black Hat=Unethical Techniques(Search engine doesn't like)
  
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Gail Sober

16 years ago

Let's start with this: it has nothing to do with legality

.That's what I was saying (not jedi code law lol)

Going faster than the posted speed limit is illegal. bh generally has little to do with law.

It's more to do with what Google likes and what it doesn't.

There's more to it than what google likes.

Another example

We set up a link exchange. I know your script doesn't filter junk traffic so I run a proxy/click bot (or just purchase junk traffic) forcing you to send your good traffic to me while sending you fake/poor clicks. This I would consider BH (or you could be sending this junk traffic to article directory to increase your article views)

I definitely agree 100% on the RED hat description though

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orvn

16 years ago

Originally Posted by Gail Sober

We set up a link exchange. I know your script doesn't filter junk traffic so I run a proxy/click bot (or just purchase junk traffic) forcing you to send your good traffic to me while sending you fake/poor clicks. This I would consider BH (or you could be sending this junk traffic to article directory to increase your article views)

That's a good example, thanks!

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socialbookmark

16 years ago

White hat gives slow and permanent results but Black hat gives fast and unstable result.

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faceblogger

16 years ago

White Hat - Natural Process
Black Hat - Artificial Process

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tdd1984

16 years ago

Originally Posted by BradRich

How would you guys explain white hat and black hat and which is more popular with successful internet marketers?

White hat long term.

Black hat for short term, but fast profits.

Originally Posted by WillR

White hat = legal
Black hat = illegal
Grey hat = inbetween / on the edge.

I'm pretty sure that's the distinction in a nutshell.

Originally Posted by ncmedia

White Hat = Legal

Black Hat = Not Legal

Most profitable = No correct answer, both make boatloads, big IM'ers that depend on branding their name often play gray at most rarely/never BlueFart, others don't give a s#it and bank taking on the risk of consequence.

If you have to ask = don't do it.

EDIT: Damn you guys posted like bullets.

Black hat is not illegal. Black hat is just against Google's policy nothing more. You might get into trouble if your doing some trademark ranking. Other then that it's not "illegal."

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Mike Grant

16 years ago

Tons of ignorance in this thread.

Sigh.

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JackPowers

16 years ago

Black hat is what made Google the awesome search engine that it is.

Black hatters are sort of beta testers for Google, except they get paid with affiliate commissions.

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Ronny Kibet

16 years ago

From my perspective white hat is what search engines view as legit. They accept this SEO method. Black hat is the exact opposite, it like cheating the search engines to rank well. Which by the way won't take you forever before getting noticed.

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ukbuddy2

16 years ago

ok here's my 2p worth

Black hat is chasing the latest opp for a loophole - and no commissions if caught

White hat - building a sustainable business model you can easily rinse and repeat.

if you are a newbie and doing blackhat you will be working your butt for a quick return but normally not sustainable

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How would you explain white hat and black hat?

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