Two Weeks of lost revenue (Problem fixed)

[supergml]

I've been an Adsense Publisher since 2004.
On january 14th, from a revenue of $XX.XX a day suddenly my earnings went to $0.XX, yes, just a few cents. and there were no Page Views neither.
I checked my websites, and everything was looking good. Didn't have anaylitis implemented on them but had statcounter on them. The traffic seemed fine. And I could see adds being served. I called friends around the globe, and they checked the websites on their browser, everything was fine.
I contacted Google Adsense representative, and the answers look automatically, THIS IS YOUR FAULT. Check the code, is a problem because you stopped a traffic campaign (Never had one). etc. when if you see the graph (the adsense representative could see it), the drop in revenue and no page views should also pay attention.
For security reasons and just in case, I deleted all my websites, put analytics code on them and upload everything again.
The problem persisted. It was driving me crazy. I knew the bug was not on my side. Everytime there was an update on the Adsense stats, it wasn't increasing, it was like resetting itself, and put the last stat. So by the end of the day I was left with just a few cents. Then I realized I was getting revenue just for Adsense for Search, and not for Adsense for Content.
Then I just tried this AND I WORKED ! Not only that I started to get revenue again I was able to recreate the problem.

I went to settings.>> Site managemen >> And I unchecked "Only my owned sites are authorized to use my ad code", deleted all my owned sites on the list.
Then I put back all of them one by one. And voilá my Adsense stats, clicks, and page views started to work again. I had PageViews. Clicks, Actve View Viewable, and of course REVENUE !
On Sunday I checked again "Only my owned sites are authorized to use my ad code" and the problem started again, No views, no clicks, and a few cents of revenue. I deleted as the day before all the sites on Sites management, unchecked the "Only my owned..." and then put back the list of my Owned sites.
Since then myrevenue is back to normal.

I always had the "Only my owned sites..." checked, so there was nothing on my site that made this lost of revenue. Of course that now I left it unchecked.
I know the security issues of living "Only my owned sites.." unchecked, but if I check it it will mean no revenue (or just a few cents) at all.

[not2easy]

The problem looks as if it is a domain without a canonical rewrite. If your site is at "example.com" and you can access your pages with either www.example.com or just plain example.com (without www) and only one version is listed in your AdSense account, then that would be an expected result. If not, it would suggest that there are quite a few framed or scraped copies out there that are showing your ads intact.

[supergml]

I haven't change the list of owned sites in years ! Was there a change from Google side?
A few years back I was even in a daily $XXX.XX revenue, drop in the last years to $XX.XX and then in January dropped to a few cents. After my fix, I'm back to the normal $XX.XX.
The problem was only with content not with Search.
If I have on the list of sites owned "example.com" I cannot add "www.example.com". If I try to do that it doesn't appear on the list.
As I understood if I list :example.com
Then it includes
www.example.com
forum.example.com
example.com/widgets.

Isn't it?

[not2easy]

I don't know offhand where the information is found in AdSense, sorry. But I know that in GSC (old GWT) they view www and non-www as two different sites and I know that for the first site I switched over to https, I found out that I needed to add that domain in AdSense though it had been there for years with http://www.example.com listed.

These two examples would be included, but for both "sites":
forum.example.com
example.com/widgets

The canonical rewrite can be added in your htaccess rewrites section if you're on Apache server, then they can only access one version of your domain. More specific information is found in the Apache forum here: [webmasterworld.com...] and in that forum's Library: [webmasterworld.com...]

A basic version is:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^(www\.example\.com)?$
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

[supergml]

not2easy, I have the 301 redirect for www implemented on my websites on the .htaccess file.
I still had the problem when I checked the "only my owned.."
I have listed on list of domains the "example.com". Should recognize with the www
If I try to add to the list the www.example.com", it would put just the "example.com" without the www.

As I wrote before, I'm a publisher since 2004, never had a problem like that and out of the blue, without touching anything from my side, the problem appeared.
Right now the pageviews, clicks and revenue are back to normal.

[MrSavage]

I'm not saying your post here is going to save me, but you describe a similar situation as to what I'm experiencing. No pressure, but you have me tingling with anticipation. I'm waiting for the income to start rolling back in! In all seriousness, I am giving this a try as of right now. I honestly have had a similar demise and I've been twiddling my thumbs thinking it was a temporary situation, but not from my end. Let's see what happens...

[born2run]

So in adsense should we add www.example.com and example.com as owned sites? I have a redirect in .htaccess for example.com to www.example.com.

Kindly assist. Thanks!

[not2easy]

re: adding versions - I don't see a reason to add a version if it can't be accessed. My mention of that issue was in case it was having some effect, but as supergml explained, it did not.