Forum Moderators: open
Is this considered spam?
Your page will not be ranked according to the content that is on it, so it would be cheating. Spam.
IMHO anyway.
Scott :)
I've done that myself through a meta-refresh (although on each redirected page I included a <META NAME="ROBOTS" CONTENT="NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW"> tag so as not to have the pages indexed by any bots)
Is this ok? Or could it incur some kind of penalty? Keeping in mind these are essentially blank pages with 0 content, other than the metah-refresh (so I'm not trying to fool any engines, etc.)
I would look askance at this. A sneaky redirect is one that effectively shows different content to the user and a bot, and that's basically what this would be doing.
Googleguy,
What you said is music to my ears. :)
I have reported about a dozen of those sneaky pages, all ranked in Google's top 10 results: check your mailbox. ;)
ikbenhet1,
That happens when the cached spam page is using a client-side (JavaScript) redirect to a relative URL, so you will get a 404 error because the destination page is not found on google.com.
WebFusion,
I would use just a regular link with the <META NAME="ROBOTS" CONTENT="NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW"> tag.
I've turned in spam reports, using WW, GG and my nickname, and explained that the person doing this is absolutely dominating the serps with his/her spammy sites. I mean 90% of the top 10 in some cases! So far, no joy.
It's not just one site that does this but a couple of them. Any chance this will get filtered out?
Meanwhile, each day that goes by allows this person to cheat, and to profit.
Sorry, this was a tricky way to draw attention to the problem, but what else can I do?
Totally agree w/you.
Sneaky client-side redirects are really nasty because they make for a very subtle form of cloaking, one that is not too easy to spot I'm afraid.
I have been submitting spam reports about sites that have achieved top rankings using dozens of pages filled with hidden kws/links and a simple JavaScript redirect or meta refresh tag for months.
Has anything changed? Sadly, no. :(
What more can I say? Let's all hope the Google Team can come up with an error-proof algo to filter out pages that are using client-side redirects to spam the index. A short-term alternative would be to manually filter the spam pages that have been reported (or at least, those that have been repeatedly reported) as such.
Not so easy to automate. Meta refreshs are easy to detect and it's possible to detect JS redirects because there are only so many permutations of .location .href .replace window. document. etc. which do redirect and aren't used as framebreakers, counter code and so on. Determining the purpose "to spam the index" is the real problem. Redirects can be legit in many cases and even tons of redirecting pages on a server can be (amateurish but) not sneaky. Also, state of the art spammers use server sided redirects. I guess client-side redirects are just a drop in the ocean.
>A short-term alternative would be to manually filter the spam pages that have been reported...
That's no option in a rapidly growing database of 3,083,324,652 URLs.
IMHO the only way to handle spam on the long haul is filing enough qualified spam reports to enable Google improving their filters. I know it's frustrating sometimes, but that's definitely the way the cookie crumbles.
How do you compete against these guys? I find my site get's pushed by these spammers. I try to get more links and add content but each month the guys that were already there somehow rank better but there are also new sites, doing the same thing, there as well. It's like bringing a knife to a gun fight.
SebastianX,
Are having to deal with these redirect sites? It's all well and good to say "That's how the cookie crumbles" but how would you react if you were pushed down in the serps by these guys. Not only pushed down, but 90% of the sites around you are either the same site or one owned by the same guy. It's easy when it's not costing YOU money.
Here's the code these guys are using:
document.write("<NOLAYER><IFRAME SRC=http://" + " width=" + w + " height=" + hi + " scrolling=no marginwidth=0 marginheight=0 hspace=0 vspace=0 frameborder=0>");
document.write("</IFRAME></NOLAYER>");
Whining doesn't help. Help yourself by helping Google. You know your field better than Googles engineers, thus you can identify spam right from the SERP. Study the spam results, search for other keyword phrases targeted by the same spammer and soon you will identify patterns. All large spammers produce detectable spoors in Googles index, because even high sophisticated spamindexing applies (complex)systematic patterns. By the way, most of these guys are lazy and reuse their scripts, keyword collections and templates, what simplifies your tracking.
Reporting spam networks with a description of your research to Google should help more than a plain list of spam results above your spot on the SERP.
Best of luck.
Anyway it is still good to know that at least something is being done about the spammers (although I don't know why there was the fanfare about letting some back in this dance).
Plus it isn't the function of this forum and if it were, GG would no doubt be inundated with spam reports.
I think that only extreme offenders are hand edited - the rest are taken into account within algo tweaks, which can take a few months take effect.
At the end of the day, what may be an important offence to you or I, may be low on the list of priorities of Google.
The spam report is there to give us a chance to report spam - it doesn't mean it will be actioned there and then.
Frankly, I would submit the report and forget about it and your competitors. Concentrate your efforts on developing your own site and exploring new markets to target where your competitors aren't a problem.
At the end of the day, any spammy techniques are nothing but short term fixes - if you are serious about your business then you need to look to the long term.
Scott
Not so easy to automate. Meta refreshs are easy to detect and it's possible to detect JS redirects because there are only so many permutations of .location .href .replace window. document. etc. which do redirect and aren't used as framebreakers, counter code and so on. Determining the purpose "to spam the index" is the real problem.
SebastianX,
Sure it's difficult to automate, but let's try to draw a line between legitimate and illicit uses of client-side redirects: frame-buster scripts simply reload the current document in the main window, while the redirects that I've seen all replace the current document with a totally different page. That's an important distinction IMO. Besides, I can't think of any legitimate reason for using a client-side script that automatically redirects the user to a totally different page as soon as the page has loaded (i.e., without requesting any input from the user).
An alternative approach to attack the problem might be a better analysis of page content: most of the doorway pages that I have seen using client-side redirects are essentially made of huge unordered lists of keywords, and/or hidden text and links to other similar pages. Paying more attention to hidden text and links (and I mean unsophisticated, almost naive tricks like #FFFFFF text on a #FFFFFF background --yes, it's unbelievable but that works!) Google should be able to get rid of at least a good portion of spam.
Finally, and I don't know if this is at all possible, Google might incorporate a JavaScript parser/interpreter in its anti-spam arsenal, so that client-side redirects are given the same treatment as server-side (HTTP status code 301) redirects: NOINDEX, FOLLOW. ;)
Just my $0.02 anyway.
[edited by: Giacomo at 11:03 am (utc) on Mar. 12, 2003]
c1bernaught,
I have been there before them and will stay there long after they have disappeared. I am not scared when I find I've lost a couple positions to a spam site, because I know they will not last. I just submit a detailed spam report, then I sit by the river and wait. ;)
One last thing: As GoogleGuy repeatedly said, if you are playing by the rules there is no reason not to disclose your identity to Google when submitting a spam report. That should help those who read it "put a name with a face", and hopefully it will also add some credibility to your feedback.
Reporting spam networks with a description of your research to Google should help more than a plain list of spam results above your spot on the SERP.
SebastianX,
Sorry but I have to disagree: I believe that submitting a single result per site using the regular spam report form should be more than enough. If the spammers have set up a network of interlinked web sites, and those sites are in the index, then Google should be perfectly able to follow links and identify hubs and patterns much better (and faster) than we can do. After all, it's their index. ;)
>...let's try to draw a line between legitimate and illicit uses of client-side redirects...
I meant to use frame-busters as example for legitimate on-site redirects, the context was JS redirects at all and the difficulty to analyze JS with a bot.
IMHO nearly all client-side redirects are plain BS, but there are tons of informative websites operated by webmasters who simply do not have the necessary skills and others on hosts which don't allow the usage of better ways to deal with moved pages etc. In this area it even may be legit to redirect to another free host. My point was that Google can't take a client-side (perhaps conditional or temporary) redirect as spam indicator and penalize all redirecting pages, it's more complex - you've mentioned a few other indications.
>I can't think of any legitimate reason to use a client-side script that automatically redirects the user to a totally different page as soon as the page has loaded (i.e., without requesting any input from the user).
Yup, these pages should not get indexed. The problem is to identify sneaky redirects with a bot, but I guess Google can manage it sooner or later.
>IMHO nearly all client-side redirects are plain BS
Agreed. ;)
> [...] hosts which don't allow the usage of better ways to deal with moved pages etc. In this area it even may be legit to redirect to another free host. [...] Google can't take a client-side (perhaps conditional or temporary) redirect as spam indicator and penalize all redirecting pages
I am not suggesting that pages using immediate (and unconditional) client-side redirects be penalized, but just that they are given the same treatment as pages issuing a 301 redirect status code: NOINDEX, FOLLOW. It's that simple. ;)
> The problem is to identify sneaky redirects with a bot, but I guess Google can manage it sooner or later.
I really hope so. It would be interesting to hear back from GoogleGuy on that subject.
And you want their free traffic ;)
I think it depends on how hard you got hit. If you went down 20+ positions due to spam it should worth it to invest more time. Google is good to us, why shouldn't we return the favour and be good to Google? Especially when it's in our own interest ;)
My understanding of handling a permanent redirect by bots is slightly different.
'HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently' and 'Location: newURL' means:
Change thisURL in your index to newURL (or delete thisURL if newURL is already indexed), <edit> GET page from newURL and </edit> process the content (if not NOINDEX or Disallowed) and follow links (if not NOFOLLOW).
I agree, unconditional client-side redirects should be treated as 301, with extensions (simplified by ignoring other important factors):
If there are many pages redirecting to the same target, source domain should get red-flagged.
If there are many pages on different domains redirecting to the same target, target should get red-flagged and source domains should get penalized (for spamming or plain stupidity).
If there are many pages redirecting to target with a query string in the URL (affiliate links), source-domain should get banned for blatant spamming and target should get red-flagged.
...
[edited by: SebastianX at 1:50 pm (utc) on Mar. 12, 2003]
Google is good to us, why shouldn't we return the favour and be good to Google? Especially when it's in our own interest ;)
SebastianX, I actually do my best to "be good to Google" and lend my hand whenever I can. :)
However, I think that submitting a regular spam report through the online form is sufficient in most cases: when I stumble across a network of doorway pages, I just report a single URL specifying "Contains links to other similar doorway pages" in the comments field, confident that Google's powerful tools will do the rest.
That said, feel free to investigate further and send Google a more detailed analysis if you feel that is worth the pain.
'HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently' and 'Location: newURL' means:
Change thisURL in your index to newURL (or delete thisURL if newURL is already indexed), process the content (if not NOINDEX or Disallowed) and follow links (if not NOFOLLOW).
Actually, HTTP 301 status codes are issued in the server headers before any content is output to the client, so I don't think the redirecting page's content should be indexed at all.
<added:>
10.3.2 301 Moved Permanently [w3.org]</added>The requested resource has been assigned a new permanent URI and any future references to this resource SHOULD use one of the returned URIs.
[...]
The new permanent URI SHOULD be given by the Location field in the response. Unless the request method was HEAD, the entity of the response SHOULD contain a short hypertext note with a hyperlink to the new URI(s).
I choose the pain -whereever it's possible- coz I got hit really nasty, recurring over years :(
However, as long as everybody reports spam at all ... :)
I'm sure they are on the right track and will be able to filter out more spam soon.
Nevertheless, I really hope that GoogleGuy checks out this thread: plenty of valuable suggestions in here.
Your Knowledge of redirects, their uses and ways to detect them is truly awesome.
I'll invest some time and energy into learning more about them.
As far as spam reporting goes, I have done quite a bit of research and have added that to my spam reports, along with my name, etc..
Creating this thread was a last resort. I try not to get too excited when I see spam. However, this was an extreme case and it seems to be getting worse.
This type of cheating has become a business model. When a webmaster can spam, get into the top 10, and stay there for months, it has to be very profitable. This is very bad.
Ok, why does it matter if a few spammers get away with it? Maybe it's just "whining" on my part, but here it is. It matters because not only are the guys who are following the rules getting screwed, the end user is now getting poor search results within certain themes, and eventually my "free google traffic" won't be worth as much as people find a better search solution. When 80% or 90% of the top 10 or 20, in a given theme, is all the exact same site, it's a poor search result. This seeming lack of ability to make these spammers "go away quickly" also breeds more "get rich quick" scam artists (spam artists?). I mean, why not spam google? You make some quick bucks and probably won't get busted. If you do get busted, so what? Start again!
Again, if the attitude is -- "Hey man, relax. Spend some more time on your sites and these guy's will go away .... eventually." -- Then we have a problem. I don't know about anyone else here, but I spend a considerable amount of time, money and energy on my web business. I'll fight to stay in business. Back me into a corner and I'll come out fighting, dirty if I have to.
This type of cheating has become a business model. When a webmaster can spam, get into the top 10, and stay there for months, it has to be very profitable. This is very bad.
This kind of spam is a specialty of unethical SEO firms. I have often found hidden links to SEO web sites in the redirecting pages. I know who and where these guys are, and how they work. A wise webmaster is unlikely to take such a risk because he knows that his web site might disappear from the search results completely. On the contrary, unethical SEO firms make big bucks by abusing their client's trust. However, I agree with Google on the following sentence:
Ultimately, you are responsible for the actions of any companies you hire [google.com]
The problem is that penalizing clients' web sites, while necessary, is not enough: until these SEO firms are allowed to employ this kind of tricks and get away scot-free, Google will be just scratching the surface of the problem.
Paraphrasing what you said,
This way of screwing up clients has become a business model among unethical SEO firms. When a SEO can spam, get their clients into the top 10, and have them stay there for months, they will get more and more clients just by showing off their successful results: "See? It works a treat!". And this is very, very bad. :(
Hmm... I didn't consider that this may be an SEO firm "helping" a website owner. If this is the case, you're right, this is very, very bad. Unfortunately it must still be profitable.
I do believe that this isn't purely the work of unethical SEO firms. I've done some research into the abusers in my theme. They are generally based in europe, at least they use a european address, and use .us domains (Please don't misunderstand, I'm not saying anything bad about european webmasters). These guys are good at the spam game.
I don't want to give Italian SEOs a bad name, but believe me, we have our own black sheep. ;)
I wouldn't call client-side redirects "poor man's cloaking": as long as those tricks work, they will continue to be employed by webmasters and unethical SEO firms as well.
I just hope that Google can spot them using the URLs I provided in my spam reports, and push them out of business by penalizing their spam networks.
Do you suppose a web crawler could be written that finds this type of specific spam? If so, what are your thoughts on Google accepting the spider's log as a spam report?
This might be a good way to fight back. Perhaps the webmaster community could help Google by taking care of some of this spam administration.
Perhaps a volunteer editor could take in the spam reports, for Google, look into them, and then make immediate changes when necessary.
Just a thought.
The best thing that we as Google users can do to help is, I believe, keep on submitting detailed spam reports.
