MSN Live Search hiding referrer information?

[statguy]

It seems that Live Search (search.msn.com) is somehow hiding the referrer information that is sent to browsers, as a result this search engine can not be detected by tracking tools anymore.

Has anyone else noticed this and if yes, is there a workaround?

[coopster]

A belated welcome to WebmasterWorld, statguy.

There is a featured discussion happening right now that may be of interest to you:
Lost referrer [webmasterworld.com]

[cgrantski]

It's not exactly hiding referrers, at least not all the time. It has changed the domain name that appears in the referrer field and analytics tools aren't recognizing the new one(s). With most stats programs you can force them to recognize the new ones.

For WebTrends, for example, you need to find the file(s) named "keywords.ini" and in the section [MSN] substitute the following:

[MSN]
ID1=search.msn.
ID2=livesearch.
ID3=search.live.
KeywordIndicator1=q=&q
KeywordIndicator2=mt=
KeywordIndicator3=q=

Since this all dates from last week, you'll have a gap in your MSN visits unless you roll back your reports to before that point and re-analyze.