Ever heard of this googlespam tactic?

Hidden links to its own yahoo directory page

[steveb]

I've been studying a web of forty or so near-duplicate doorway pages that contain 15 to 30 hidden links each. They create a web of false pagerank by linking only to each other and getting links from the Yahoo directory. They do NOT have links from dmoz because a human editor would surely notice forty nearly identical doorway sites.

Thus, they rely on Yahoo for their core pagerank. So what do they do? They all have hidden links BACK to their Yahoo Directory page!

I've cruised through a bunch of other directory pages, and rarely are there any backward links shown to a Yahoo directory page (except from other Yahoo pages). But these spammers have taken the themeing concept to the next step, and send pagerank to Yahoo, so they can get pagerank back.

I'm relatively new to these issues, but this level of spamming chutzpah is pretty staggering.

[nutsandbolts]

I do this on one of my sites simply because my Yahoo! category has my site with a nice pair of Cool sunglasses next to it - it's good to say - Hey check us out on Yahoo! - they think we are cool.

Mind you, that was 1998 when they first did that - is Yahoo! still classed as cool now? ;)

If they are using Hidden links - that's rather daft. But I wouldn't call it spammy to use Yahoo! to get a pagerank for a site. The $299 a year has to be of SOME use after all...

[ciml]

Steve, the network structure that you describe is, amusingly, not a particularly good way to utilise PageRank. Forty links from Yahoo! will help them get listed higher, with or without a spammy site structure.

I don't think that we could call it a Google problem as such. Google maps the Web as it is, and if someone spams a popular directory like Yahoo! then they are likely to get credit for it.

Google have been quite relaxed about link spam for a while. Remember the PR0 penalties? (not you nutsandbolts, I know you haven't forgotten:)) People are starting to get complacent again, and I wouldn't be surprised if Google decide to have another purge some time. When you see a 'PageRank perpretual machine' network built on spammy sites and heavy interlinking, my advice is not to follow suit.

[nutsandbolts]

not you nutsandbolts, I know you haven't forgotten - Nutsandbolts rocks back and to in the corner due to the mere mention of those dark months again

Good points. Even though it's been there for years, I removed the link back to Yahoo! Pah, people will never know it's a cool site now! ;) But still, not worth the risk of it looking spammy..

/me walks on Google egg shells daily now..

[ciml]

I doubt that linking back to the Yahoo! category is likely to get you penalised (unless it's a very spammy category...)

It's the "forty or so near-duplicate doorway pages that contain 15 to 30 hidden links each" that make me think they may be in peril one day.

[steveb]

> It's the "forty or so near-duplicate doorway
> pages that contain 15 to 30 hidden links each"
> that make me think they may be in peril one day.

I hope that day comes soon.