Google Facts & Fiction ambiguity

"...almost nothing a competitors can do to harm..."

[David_1cog]

From Google's webmaster FAQ :

Fiction: A competitor can ruin a site's ranking somehow or have another site removed from Google's index.

Fact: There is almost nothing a competitor can do to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index. Your rank and your inclusion are dependent on factors under your control as a webmaster, including content choices and site design.

"...almost nothing..."?! That's a little worrying. Is GoogleGuy able to comment, or better still make a clarification on the FAQ?

[Lots0]

Google just changed this statement a few weeks ago, if I remember correctly. It used to say "There is nothing a competitor can do to harm your ranking..."

In fact there are a lot of things that a competitor can do to harm your ranking in Google. Google knows this and has known it for quite some time. They (Google) just decided that enough people knew how to hurt a competitors site that they would change the wording in their facts to be much more ambiguous. So people could not say they were outright liars.

[ggrot]

Of course a competitor can hurt your rankings, they could hack your server (or pay off your hosting company) and remove your keywords for one. Of course google has to be ambiguous.

[Brett_Tabke]

nice one ggrot.

[Lots0]

they could hack your server

LOL - Now that’s one I wasn’t even thinking of.

I believe that the Bush administration wants to give hackers life in federal prison - I would think twice before hacking a server.

[digitalghost]

A competitor doesn't have to hack your server, they can just hijack the site. Or they can go to Fast, check your backlinks and start paying the sites that link to you not to link to you. Of course they would start with those site with the highest PageRank...

Or they can travel from forum to forum, drop some code and suddenly your keywords start appearing in hundreds of auto-generated pages next to meaningless gibberish, then they report you for spamming.

Just a few things to help everyone sleep better. ;)

[rfgdxm1]

ggrot, Google clearly was meaning something at Google's end, not something so obvious as hacking your server.

>A competitor doesn't have to hack your server, they can just hijack the site. Or they can go to Fast, check your backlinks and start paying the sites that link to you not to link to you. Of course they would start with those site with the highest PageRank...

But then, Google is just accurately ranking your site based on actual links. There is one evil way I have thought of that a competitor could hurt a site with Google though. This is to buy some minor site you exchange links with, such as an info one, and add it to a link farm with a bunch of hidden links. You become part of a link farm, and never realize it. Until your site gets the Google Death Penalty. :(

[Lots0]

Hey guys - I think anyone that has looked closely at this issue knows that there are a LOT of ways to hurt your competitor in Google - But I don't think it's responsible to list them here ;)

[toddb]

Thanks Lotso. What little hair I have left was starting to fall out just reading this thread.

[digitalghost]

>>I think anyone that has looked closely at this issue knows that there are a LOT of ways to hurt your competitor in Google

The people that have looked closely at it are the people that are doing it. :) The people that are wondering if it can happen need to be informed of the ways in which a competitor can hurt a site. Remaining ignorant of an issue is a sure way to get bit in the arse.

If the issues are noted maybe the folks at Google will take steps to remedy them. Security through obscurity is the least effective method.

[Lots0]

The people that have looked closely at it are the people that are doing it.

Well I have looked very closely at this issue and I don't - I beat my competitors by out SEO'ing them, by building better pages and better sites as whole.

I think anyone that claims to "study the Search Engines" would be a fool not to study this aspect or least give it some thought.

And a lot of people read these forums - why give the sick individual that wanted to do this kind of thing, but didn’t know how ideas?

But I guess the mods here agree with you and not me or else those posts would have been edited.

<added>

If the issues are noted maybe the folks at Google will take steps to remedy them.

Google has known about these and lots and lots of other ways for a VERY long time - For most of it there is nothing they can do even if they wanted to.</added>

[digitalghost]

>>But I guess the mods here agree with you and not me or else those posts would have been edited.

I don't think it is so much that the mods agree with me as that those techniques are so well known that trying to limit their exposure is futile. In fact, those are just a few, there are many more techniques out there and people are taking advantage of them.

[fathom]

There is almost nothing a competitor can do to harm your ranking...

but that competitor could host 30 site's highly optimized, 1,000 of links, and this would harm your rankings.