Google to Change Algorithm to stop Blackhat & Spam

by nmh
19 replies
  • SEO
  • |
I just read this. How will this change IM? Below is a copy of the article from WebProNew by Jason Lee Miller. I know some in the WSO sell some blackhat techniques etc. (I personally don't use) but what does this mean for all of us in general? Are some of the things we are taught going to change?

Blackhat SEO spammers force Google's hand

Google is set to make changes to its search ranking algorithm to combat the spate of links leading to malicious web pages appearing at the top of Google's search results, according to an inside source.

Over the past few months, cybercriminals have beenusing blackhat techniques to manipulate search rankings. When it first began, they were marginally successful at following Google Trends to find buzzy search queries and elevating a newly created targeted webpage.

But after a short period of time, these same gangs appear to have become disturbingly effective. Last week, when researching a news story, I found the top 5 results all led to fake scareware pages.

Obviously if Google fails to do something about this manipulation, users will lose trust and the good ole days of Google will be over fast. A Googler speaking on condition of anonymity told WebProNews a ranking change is pending that tackles spam of this kind. Once the change goes live, users shouldn't see it "nearly as often."

A report from security company PandaLabs identified over a million links targeting malicious webpages ranking for auto part searches. Google noted that many of the phrases mentioned in the report were rare. A phrase like [1989 Nissan Pickup Truck Engine Check Light Troubleshooting], for example, only appears on attack sites set up by spammers, which explains why Google brought back so many attack sites in response to it and similar queries.
Google's response seems also an admission of how difficult it is to provide fresh, timely search results while simultaneously combating spammers. Part of the appeal of Twitter to many people is the platform's ability to provide real-time information; the live Web works remarkably well there so far because Twitter's set up isn't very conducive to spam (yet). At least Twitter has to some extent control over accounts.

Google, on the other hand, cannot control for content appearing on the Web at large, and historically its famous algorithm performed better than any other at weeding out spammy webpages and malicious results. Unfortunately, that was a version of the Web that was more static. The live Web presents entirely new challenges manifesting as the first major weakness the search engine has faced.

The company naturally didn't have a comment on the recently pondered "link velocity" ranking factor. Search engine optimization experts have identified the speed at which organic links appear as a possible important influence.
Link velocity therefore aids in explaining how blackhatters were able to manipulate search results by dropping enormous amounts of link spam into comment and discussion areas of social sites. The freshness or buzzy nature of a query also aided in this pursuit, and cybercriminals merely have to follow Google Trends and Google News to know which keywords and phrases to target.
#algorithm #blackhat #change #google #spam #stop
  • Profile picture of the author Allen Graves
    First thing that comes to my mind (related to most of us) is mass article submissions, autobloggers and auto-social-commentors.

    hmmm...

    Seems to me that ethical practice is just as king as content is!

    AL
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    • Profile picture of the author CalGolden
      Originally Posted by Allen Graves View Post

      First thing that comes to my mind (related to most of us) is mass article submissions, autobloggers and auto-social-commentors.

      hmmm...

      Seems to me that ethical practice is just as king as content is!

      AL
      Damn, I was just getting ready to buy Syndik8 Autopligg! Oh, well...

      Remember, the tortoise always wins the race. Long, slow link building always prevails over fly-by-night blackhat techniques.

      It will be very interesting to see how Google works this out. Hmmmm...
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  • Profile picture of the author sbucciarel
    Banned
    I doubt that it will impact sites who build links naturally.
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  • Profile picture of the author Steve Peters Benn
    I agree, it will largely be a storm in a tea cup. But then again - I think this is more PR than anything too real, manual oversight on the top offenders will sort out the problem of spammy links for now at a least.
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  • Profile picture of the author MichaelHiles
    It will be interesting to see how they balance this against linked news stories, sites, etc... that go viral across the blogsphere within hours. How will Google determine an explosion of instantaneous popularity across thousands of blogs vs. engineered article stuffing, etc...?
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  • Profile picture of the author Steve Peters Benn
    I don't think they would need to purchase them, just stick in some captcha, cookies and javascript and that will snarl things up. Beyond that there are lots of easy ways for them to identify bots coming from fixed IPs etc.

    There will be some clever people out there who will always get around Google stuff like this - it all depends on how much it is worth financially to you, I guess. Personally, I don't see the point in trying to fake viral stuff.

    I guess they will be using trustrank stuff along with natural growth curves for viral stuff, versus machine stuff, which I imagine has a completely none natural growth curve...

    Be interesting to watch though...
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  • Profile picture of the author derekwong28
    If and when they bring this out, expect a lot of "collateral damage" i.e. complaints from webmasters who used complete white hat techniques but were hit nonetheless.
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  • Profile picture of the author Brawnydt
    I've read this same post as well, and I'm not sure I believe it. Looks a lot like linkbait to me. No real sources, and no quotes to anything official. Smells fishy to me.

    Now Google is making some changes with the new referral urls and the 'cd' tag that shows your SERP results, as well as personalized search results.

    Black hat is always going to be caught eventually. But what exactly black hat is these days is a gray area...
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  • Profile picture of the author Jenie0109
    i hope it can be implemented...one day..
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  • Profile picture of the author Steve Peters Benn
    I'm sure some legit people will be burnt as well, but in the long term, ethical will win the race. The blackhatters will have all moved onto the next opportunity loophole I guess.
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    • Profile picture of the author bigmoney4me
      Hi,

      I agree with Steve Peters Benn. The blackhatters/spammers will always be in a cat and mouse game with the SE. Unfortunately as new policy changes and/or algos arise to combat this, the legitimate webmasters will suffer to some degree.

      My theory is, always build useful relevant sites that provide a good user experience and you will avoid most problems with the SE.

      Barry
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  • Profile picture of the author scene4u
    I won't have much of an effect on me because I stick to the white hat techniques and steer clear of any kind of automated services because Google is gradually catching up. Build good quality content and quality back links if you want to perform well in the search engines in the future.
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  • Profile picture of the author roukarous
    If your working whitehat and delivering good content, there's no reason to be afraid.
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  • Profile picture of the author zealotknight
    looks like indexing in Google will be more difficult because if this.
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  • Profile picture of the author Allen Graves
    A lot of you seem to be underestimating what I think Google knows and what I think they can do (and are possibly already doing).

    A multi-billion dollar publicly traded company usually has "scouts" that go out and watch what their users are doing. You see it in any industry. They make changes and even give individual circumstantial slack.

    I don't believe Google is any different. I think their scout-and-develop modus operandi is what got them to where they are today.

    I also believe that their human internet existance is a lot bigger than everyone thinks.

    As far as the story, I also thought it could be link bait as well, but that's not my call.

    AL

    p.s. zealotknight - you are not allowed to link to your own site in your posts.
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  • Profile picture of the author Steve Peters Benn
    Hey Allen,

    I suspect they use a lot of manual intervention in rankings anyway. I've encountered that kind of thing quite a lot. They know by shaking a rattle and taking some action, most of the easy living blackhatters will move onto the next thing.
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  • Profile picture of the author MarkOwens
    I highly doubt it would work well even if the algorithm is changed. At most, it will ban all of those crappy autoblogs that just take posts from other sources but the majority of the spammers would still get away with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeMorgan
    Yeah,

    Google should definitively and continuously update its algorisms to fight black hat spammers who continuously find holes to manipulate Google search engine ranking .

    Mike
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