Removing Google Penalty After a Hack is Fixed

[Xenyo]

Our < server > was hacked End/Jan/Early Feb 07 and hidden links added. We only noticed this around 2-3 weeks later after our site started dropping from Google and promptly removed the links.

The site is around 2 years old and, we were ranking first position for highly competitive terms before the penalty for over a year and now we rank around 6th page for our own site name. Our pages seems to be all still in the index but its positions have dropped about 30-150 places.

We used a popular script which apparently is known for an injection breach. The thing is that its encrypted so theres not much we can do about it. We have added a recommended safeguard and was already developing our own script due to a previous hack a few months ago which we spotted and removed in a couple of hours.

Anyways, we have submitted a reinclusion request in on the 17th Feb and was wondering how long it usually takes for Google to get round to looking at our site?

Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

[edited by: tedster at 2:07 am (utc) on Mar. 1, 2008]

[tedster]

Sounds like you've done all you can do. It can take anywhere from, say, 2 weeks to a couple months - depending on their workload. If your request gets approved, the problem might be lifted all at once or in gradual stages.

But if while inspecting your site other problems come to light, you may have a rolling problem that continues. Hang in there!

[Xenyo]

Thx Tedster,

Yeah, we asked in Google groups for the recommended plan of action and followed it so I think we did what was right.

Its just Google's lack of communication and clarity on what the penalty is, if its penalised at all and have we done enough to warrant a lifting is very nerve-wrecking.

Without Google traffic these we days might as well fold. Note before the penalty, we were ranked 1st to 4th of all variations of < our main term >.

On your note of revealing other problems, does the description of my penalty suggest one that would be given for hidden links?... about 4 I found on sidebar and header templates, so sitewide.

Thanks again.

[edited by: tedster at 2:08 am (utc) on Mar. 1, 2008]

[tedster]

Yes - and especially if those links pointed to a "bad neighborhood."

I appreciate the nerve-wracking quality. Given the scale involved, I suppose this is the best Google feels they can offer. This kind of server hack has occured much too frequently in recent months. I wouldn't be surprised if well over a million domains have been affected, even of only for a short time.

[Lorel]

Tedster.

I'm wondering what makes a server vulnerable to attack?. I have about 30 clients on what I consider a quality host that has never had this problem (they are always upgrading their servers/software). Are some hosts/servers more vulnerable than others?

[tedster]

The upgrades are the key. Any software can have vulnerabilities. When upgrades are released for whatever software is being employed on the server, they need to be used ASAP - because the exploits have been identified and the attacks are already happening.

[Xenyo]

Yes in our case, the vulnerability was in our software rather than the server.

[dukelips]

We have a problem because one of sites had a zero PR for a long time and we submitted the request for reconsideration through the webmaster central and it took 3 months to get a new PR

[Lorel]

We have a problem because one of sites had a zero PR for a long time ...

I noticed a page on my site with zero PR this morning and did some checking and found two sites I had linked to on that page were linking to gambling or other bad neighborhoods. I removed both links. Only time will tell if that was the problem.

So run your site through a bad neighborhood link checker too.