4 ms·

Inside a Hacked SEO Backlink Network

67 points by jitbit 11y ago

jitbit 11y ago
This got me intrigued: "we got a notification from Google that stated a client website was hacked" - so Google actually does have some kind of an algorithm that detects this. And - what - kindly informs webmasters? Nice...
- patrickfl 11y ago
  Thanks for reading really appreciate it. Yes Google sends a notification via email via Google search console ( formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools) a lot of times when a site gets hacked. A lot of times they catch it long before the webmaster does most of the time it is a shared hosting with an absentee admin or webmaster. I know a lot of people in this crowd probably run across these situations all the time but a lot of people don't realize why exactly their sites got hacked and what the purpose is. Thank you so much again for reading and checking this out.
  - gcb0 11y ago
    that's a bold statement. Google does notice that when they see some link network get too big. or maybe they have honey pots and they consider your server hacked if they see your pages linking to that honey pot. but thinking they know when a server if hacked is giving them too much credit. they may know when it's part of a widely know black link network. in fact, most search engines seems to know that. reason your links are for Japanese sites is because there everyone uses the cellphone operator default search, which is crappy, but still better than Google for native language. they may be slower to react or worse at detecting black link networks. disclaimer: i work for one of the biggest western search sites in Japan. but this is my opinion.
    - johnward 11y ago
      Google analyzes pages for malware in some cases. https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en They even warn you, I've seen an interstitial popup (from google) before for one of my sites that was compromised.
    - patrickfl 11y ago
      ok yes I agree definitely too broad of a statement to say "google notifies when your site is hacked," but they definitely try. I'm assuming you read Japanese, anything else notable?
lelzwut 11y ago
I'm gay and love flaw3d
rcarrigan87 11y ago
I really wonder how effective these link networks are at SEO nowadays. Obviously it's a short term strategy either way, but can you get to first page of google for competitive terms by doing this stuff?
- trevin 11y ago
  In a word, yes. Spend some time Googling around and analyzing backlink profiles in high spam areas (designer goods, pharma, etc) and you'll see tons of pages propped up by link spam ranking highly. If you are smart about it some automated link building tactics still work very well. It's not sustainable but most people take a "churn and burn" approach and just move on to a new domain if it gets torched by Google.
  - johnward 11y ago
    Usually the linking scheme is more creative then what this article shows though. More tiers and not just linking to every site from every other site. For super competitive terms this still seems like a short term strategy but for less competitive it may still be viable. I think google has taken steps to stop this from an algorithm stand point but really I think most of there attempts are more marketing based. IE trying to scare people into not doing it anymore. It also doesn't take exploiting sites to do it. You can just buy some aged domains and throw up wordpress.
- paxtonab 11y ago
  This is 100% not effective anymore. This is just a slightly more malicious version of the the spam bots that post back links in wordpress comments, except in this case they were adding entire html pages to the sites. This is a violation of Google's duplicate content rules and if anything would be viewed negatively by Google. The efficacy of this hack is nil as the "money domains" that were profiting from these backlinks had little domain authority or relevant traffic according to the author's article. The only only way that linking strategies are viable anymore are gaining links from domains with authority or huge numbers of links. Maybe if the hacker would have created tens of thousands of back links from vulnerable fashion blogs (same category of site as the money sites) they would've gotten some SEO juice.

67 points by jitbit 11y ago

This got me intrigued: "we got a notification from Google that stated a client website was hacked" - so Google actually does have some kind of an algorithm that detects this. And - what - kindly informs webmasters? Nice...

patrickfl 11y ago
Thanks for reading really appreciate it. Yes Google sends a notification via email via Google search console ( formerly known as Google Webmaster Tools) a lot of times when a site gets hacked. A lot of times they catch it long before the webmaster does most of the time it is a shared hosting with an absentee admin or webmaster. I know a lot of people in this crowd probably run across these situations all the time but a lot of people don't realize why exactly their sites got hacked and what the purpose is. Thank you so much again for reading and checking this out.
- gcb0 11y ago
  that's a bold statement. Google does notice that when they see some link network get too big. or maybe they have honey pots and they consider your server hacked if they see your pages linking to that honey pot. but thinking they know when a server if hacked is giving them too much credit. they may know when it's part of a widely know black link network. in fact, most search engines seems to know that. reason your links are for Japanese sites is because there everyone uses the cellphone operator default search, which is crappy, but still better than Google for native language. they may be slower to react or worse at detecting black link networks. disclaimer: i work for one of the biggest western search sites in Japan. but this is my opinion.
  - johnward 11y ago
    Google analyzes pages for malware in some cases. https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/45449?hl=en They even warn you, I've seen an interstitial popup (from google) before for one of my sites that was compromised.
  - patrickfl 11y ago
    ok yes I agree definitely too broad of a statement to say "google notifies when your site is hacked," but they definitely try. I'm assuming you read Japanese, anything else notable?

lelzwut 11y ago

I'm gay and love flaw3d

rcarrigan87 11y ago

I really wonder how effective these link networks are at SEO nowadays. Obviously it's a short term strategy either way, but can you get to first page of google for competitive terms by doing this stuff?

trevin 11y ago
In a word, yes. Spend some time Googling around and analyzing backlink profiles in high spam areas (designer goods, pharma, etc) and you'll see tons of pages propped up by link spam ranking highly. If you are smart about it some automated link building tactics still work very well. It's not sustainable but most people take a "churn and burn" approach and just move on to a new domain if it gets torched by Google.
- johnward 11y ago
  Usually the linking scheme is more creative then what this article shows though. More tiers and not just linking to every site from every other site. For super competitive terms this still seems like a short term strategy but for less competitive it may still be viable. I think google has taken steps to stop this from an algorithm stand point but really I think most of there attempts are more marketing based. IE trying to scare people into not doing it anymore. It also doesn't take exploiting sites to do it. You can just buy some aged domains and throw up wordpress.
paxtonab 11y ago
This is 100% not effective anymore. This is just a slightly more malicious version of the the spam bots that post back links in wordpress comments, except in this case they were adding entire html pages to the sites. This is a violation of Google's duplicate content rules and if anything would be viewed negatively by Google. The efficacy of this hack is nil as the "money domains" that were profiting from these backlinks had little domain authority or relevant traffic according to the author's article. The only only way that linking strategies are viable anymore are gaining links from domains with authority or huge numbers of links. Maybe if the hacker would have created tens of thousands of back links from vulnerable fashion blogs (same category of site as the money sites) they would've gotten some SEO juice.