May 19

Dan Thies published a post about how people have been hacking Google’s search results using proxies to get the original sites nuked as duplicate content. He also explained how to defend sites against the problem using free PHP scripts developed by Jaimie Sirovich.

Dan Thies stated he thought many of the proxy hijack accidents were not accidents at all:
Of course, not all proxies are being run by innocent people for innocent reasons. Some of them are actually designed to hijack content - to deliver ads, etc. Some people want to steal your content, and they want the search engines to index it. In fact, I would not be surprised if a large part of the overall problem isn’t caused by such people firing links at their own proxies.
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , , , , , ,

May 15

Someone recently left a comment on my blog promoting a new keyword research tool that is registered via proxy. The competitive analysis keyword research tool has been marketed heavily via comment spam, and currently shows itself as bidding on 0 keywords, per its own competitive measures. The site gives no data about who owns it. Could it appear any less legitimate?

How do marketers create market research tools espousing the value of something they are not doing themselves, then market it via blog comment spam? It isn’t hard to send an email or buy a review. If their service is worth $90 a month (their current price) their marketing budget should include some money for paid search and public relations. They could at least have a blog comparing seasonal data and data from different companies the way Hitwise does.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , , , , ,