Forum Moderators: Robert Charlton & goodroi
Sometimes, an HTTP status 302 redirect or an HTML META refresh causes Google to replace the redirect's destination URL with the redirect URL. The word "hijack" is commonly used to describe this problem, but redirects and refreshes are often implemented for click counting, and in some cases lead to a webmaster "hijacking" his or her own URLs.
Normally in these cases, a search for cache:[destination URL] in Google shows "This is G o o g l e's cache of [redirect URL]" and oftentimes site:[destination domain] lists the redirect URL as one of the pages in the domain.
Also link:[redirect URL] will show links to the destination URL, but this can happen for reasons other than "hijacking".
Searching Google for the destination URL will show the title and description from the destination URL, but the title will normally link to the redirect URL.
There has been much discussion on the topic, as can be seen from the links below.
How to Remove Hijacker Page Using Google Removal Tool [webmasterworld.com]
Google's response to 302 Hijacking [webmasterworld.com]
302 Redirects continues to be an issue [webmasterworld.com]
Hijackers & 302 Redirects [webmasterworld.com]
Solutions to 302 Hijacking [webmasterworld.com]
302 Redirects to/from Alexa? [webmasterworld.com]
The Redirect Problem - What Have You Tried? [webmasterworld.com]
I've been hijacked, what to do now? [webmasterworld.com]
The meta refresh bug and the URL removal tool [webmasterworld.com]
Dealing with hijacked sites [webmasterworld.com]
Are these two "bugs" related? [webmasterworld.com]
site:www.example.com Brings Up Other Domains [webmasterworld.com]
Incorrect URLs and Mirror URLs [webmasterworld.com]
302's - Page Jacking Revisited [webmasterworld.com]
Dupe content checker - 302's - Page Jacking - Meta Refreshes [webmasterworld.com]
Can site with a meta refresh hurt our ranking? [webmasterworld.com]
Google's response to: Redirected URL [webmasterworld.com]
Is there a new filter? [webmasterworld.com]
What about those redirects, copies and mirrors? [webmasterworld.com]
PR 7 - 0 and Address Nightmare [webmasterworld.com]
Meta Refresh leads to ... Replacement of the target URL! [webmasterworld.com]
302 redirects showing ultimate domain [webmasterworld.com]
Strange result in allinurl [webmasterworld.com]
Domain name mixup [webmasterworld.com]
Using redirects [webmasterworld.com]
redesigns, redirects, & google -- oh my [webmasterworld.com]
Not sure but I think it is Page Jacking [webmasterworld.com]
Duplicate content - a google bug? [webmasterworld.com]
How to nuke your opposition on Google? [webmasterworld.com] (January 2002 - when Google's treatment of redirects and META refreshes were worse than they are now)
Hijacked website [webmasterworld.com]
Serious help needed: Is there a rewrite solution to 302 hijackings? [webmasterworld.com]
How do you stop meta refresh hijackers? [webmasterworld.com]
Page hijacking: Beta can't handle simple redirects [webmasterworld.com] (MSN)
302 Hijacking solution [webmasterworld.com] (Supporters' Forum)
Location: versus hijacking [webmasterworld.com] (Supporters' Forum)
A way to end PageJacking? [webmasterworld.com] (Supporters' Forum)
Just got google-jacked [webmasterworld.com] (Supporters' Forum)
Our company Lisiting is being redirected [webmasterworld.com]
This thread is for further discussion of problems due to Google's 'canonicalisation' of URLs, when faced with HTTP redirects and HTML META refreshes. Note that each new idea for Google or webmasters to solve or help with this problem should be posted once to the Google 302 Redirect Ideas [webmasterworld.com] thread.
<Extra links added from the excellent post by Claus [webmasterworld.com]. Extra link added thanks to crobb305.>
[edited by: ciml at 11:45 am (utc) on Mar. 28, 2005]
What are you an SEO?
How is it you have seen thousands?
Show me one!
I asked this once before and not one came forward.
Vin
Google Tackles the 302 Redirect Issue at Search Engine Roundtable highlights comments from GoogleGuy in this WebmasterWorld thread that Google is making changes to help ease concerns that by using redirection, others might hijack your listings in Google. Page Hijack: The 302 Exploit, Redirects and Google from Claus Schmidt provides excellent background on the issue, and does some revisiting in this Threadwatch post: Google's 302 problem solved? Also see Google's Redirect Hijacking Problem Gets Slashdotted and Redirection Problems With Google, Yahoo for more background and links.
Edited: Removed link, try using G...
Maybe nobody is coming forward, because if Google is changing things to account for it (GG post in this thread) and you can't figure out it is real, there is no real point in trying to explain further.
Justin
I hope for your sake it doesn't happen to you.
But it has happened to me on several sites. The ones I've cleaned up have all come back just fine, even though the redirects and scrapers are still there.
I suspect many people here are mistaking association for cause and effect. Just because redirect sites appear above your sites in the serps for your unique site name or title does not mean the redirects are the cause of your problem.
In fact in many cases you can analyze the scrapers and redirects that appear above your site and below your site for valuable clues as to what is wrong with your site.
Why do you think this thread is so long?
Because a lot of sites now have spam penalties that used to rank just fine.
GG post in this thread
You mean this one:
"in many of the cases that I've examined, a spam penalty comes first. That spam penalty causes the PageRank of a site to decrease. Since one of the heuristics to pick a canonical site was to take PageRank into account, the declining PageRank of a site was usually the root cause of the problem.
(italics added)
If there is a real problem I would think it would have gotten some coverage.
I also suspect that the poor excuse of an SEO that placed the code on the thousands of websites may well be trying to deflect blame.
This is a perfect cover - blame it on google.
I have seen the code placed on the websites - that is a fact one that all can see.
Would be nice to let the poor souls know - what say you forum moderator - would you be for posting a few or all here?
I believe it's that code that brought about the change in google.
When it comes to a you need faith I say I only trust in God.
As to the no post rule - I do have an email address that is not too hard to come by.
Vin
No italics necessary.
Loose English translation, 'one of the determining factors of attributing origination of content was PageRank...'
Logical conclusion: The site with the higher page rank had a beter chance of the content being attributed as theirs.
There was a problem.
Justin
BTW I firmly believe G has the right to deliver whatever results they believe best suit their needs, and are in the best interest of their sole purpose for being in existance as a publicly help corp. - To grow share holder value.
I have not ever blamed G for my ranking, or lack there of. They run their business to the best of their ability, as do I with mine.
Do I believe it is a problem for a 302 redirect to possibly attribute original content wrongfully to a site based, not on the date the content was created, but rather on a ranking that G determines? Yes. Not because it hurts my ranking or ability to do business (I am not dependent on G, and think this should be true of more businesses), but because the wrongful attribution of original content by anyone or any entity is poor at best.
Edited and Added for clarity.
While I am open to discussions about whether the 302 problem is a root cause or is symptomatic of some other problem, consider your statement:
"In fact in many cases you can analyze the scrapers and redirects that appear above your site and below your site for valuable clues as to what is wrong with your site."
Don't confuse scrapers and 302 hijackings. In the case of a truly hijacked page, the cached content is identical to your content (and how can one get a "valuable clue as to what is wrong with your site" from that?) and the actual page content is often nothing more than a fast meta refresh. Once again, not much chance of "valuable clues".
Scapers are bad, bad, bad, but they are a completely different issue than 302 hijackings (Although some scraper sites may also be hijacker sites.)
I believe in the 302 hijacking problem for various reasons, but the one that 'sold me' is that it explains the yo-yo effect of sites which have been top 10 for years dropping into oblivion, only to reappear near the top and then drop into oblivion again. I can see no logical reason why G would institute an algo that ranks a site highly, then drops it, then ranks it highly again, then drops it again.
But the possiblity that hijackers target high ranking sites which then fall out of the index, and having fallen out of the index are no longer subject to hijacking are free to re-emerge only to become victims again as they regain position seems reasonable. Thus: the yo-yo effect.
Give me another explaination of the yo-yo and I'll reconsider whether 302 hijackings are a root cause or an side effect of something else.
I think i better clarify that statement: Some pages will change URL quicker than others - i've seen it happen pretty fast (days). With "propagate" i meant "fully replace the old pages in terms of URL, snippet, cache, PR, and ranking".
>> Windows / IIS
Don't use response.redirect as that is equal to a 302 (i have to repeat that). You want to use a 301. AFAIK, there's such a thing as an "ISAPI filter" that you can buy and use, otherwise these threads will be helpful:
>> I need to see it
No you don't. Really. You need to see it solved and gone. Besides, you're a little bit late to the party as Google has removed those listings from the SERP's, so you can't see them anymore.
That said, if you trust people at SearchEngineWatch more than the people here, take a look through the SEW forums, they've got threads about this issue as well. Take any SEO related forum.
---
Welcome back dogboy, long time since i've seen your nick around here. Lots of people have received those emails, they're just a standard reply like a thank you note, nothing more than that. They don't really make any sense for this situation at all.
[edited by: claus at 9:47 am (utc) on April 27, 2005]
