I’m writing this post after a heated debate (let’s really call it tepid, tbh) between, Matt Cutts, Head of Google Search spam team and Michael Grey, re-knowned American blogger and Search Consultant, better known to many as Graywolf. The jist of the debate was around some hackers cracking into a considerable number of UK School websites and injecting porn links within the hacked websites copy : source.
Anyways, Matt (Head of Google Search) released a Twitter tweet as follows
“What is “craphat” SEO? This is craphat SEO: http://bit.ly/18fD9C (link to the above Telegraph link –NSM Edit) Quite uncool to inject porn on school forums.”
Upon reading Matt’s tweet, I read the article and without question agreed with his original synopsis of the situation, that injected links were ‘craphat seo’, but to many, that was a slap too far to the name of SEO.
Now, I can understand the anger and the unwanted and undeserved affiliation between genuine SEO’s and that of Hackers. To hack into a trustworthy domain and inject links so that will result in giving a boost to a site within the Search Engines is not your everyday SEO. In fact I would be suprised if the majority of SEO’s even know how to hack a site. Even if I did, I don’t think I would want to do something like that, nor would a majority of Black Hat SEO’s for that matter!
I have to agree with @graywolf on this one, SEO is a legitimate trade. If a select few decide to break the law, they are not doing this under the any SEO “hat” as @mattcutts put it. Hacking is a criminal activity and the two should not be confused.
Having being on the wrong end of a Hack attack Andrew I know that link injection is a tool-of-the-trade for a minority.
Many wouldn’t even contemplate doing so, or understand the ways of how-to… to a visiting bot or spider its just another link to crawl, rightly or wrongly of how the link was placed there … I think people should be aware, especially SEO’s, the darker tactics out there if only, perhaps, to make them more rounded in their knowledge of search engines.
I have to disagree with what you call “darker tactics” this isn’t a discussion of White or black hat which is essentially low & high risk SEO. Instead it’s a question of right or wrong. In this case, link injection is a form of hacking and it’s illegal.
I know there are a minority of SEO’s use this technique to game the engines but the industry should not be tarred because of it.
I would agree with you on people being aware though, for most people a sense of morality would tell you it’s wrong but if that fails then you should be aware that crossing the hacking line is in fact breaking the law.
The point (I think) GreyWolf was trying to make is that we should be attacking the perpetrators for what they are: Criminals.
Hey Paul, Thought I’d get my 2 cents worth in!
OK, so the hacker is getting the results he wants but does that mean that the end should justify the means? If I want a burger for dinner, I don’t go into the nearest field, slaughter a cow and effectively steal from the farmer! – I do it the legal way and go and get Tesco’s Finest (who slaughter it for me
).
I think that as a hacker is carrying out an illegal act, rather than calling it a version of SEO, SEO’s should be distancing themselves from something that could otherwise harm the trade. Calling it for what it is.
As for hacking school sites and adding porn links – I can only shake my head in disbelief at the kind of mind that thought that beauty up!
Hi Andrew, jeez, your like a dugwiabone
I do agree that hacking should be punishable, I’d like to punish the person that hacked my site personally, however, I’d thought I would point you to this news item re. hacking online with many things in life when money is involved, morality takes a back seat, sometimes.
“…when money is involved, morality takes a back seat, sometimes”
Just ask the BeeGees record label – where’s the morals in exposing the world to that ear-ache!
Polr, hallo
I get where your coming from, distancing yourself from this type of behaviour is a positive step for SEO I feel — but that’s not going to make it go away.
The disturbing fact is that hack attacks are becoming more and more – hate to say the word – fashionable.
You just to need to account for the rise in spammy links in blogs, high profile websites being hacked and now School sites … its a worrying trend.
I think everyobody here seems to be agreeing that they would never do this.
Black Hat SEO would still technically be ‘SEO’ although entirely inadviseable.
So then it also follows that Craphat SEO could technically be a type of ‘SEO’ although on the face of it – illegal.
We used to play Crazy Football at school, it was normal football but you were allowed to violently remove an opponent from the ball. Still football…
LOL @ Ryman, Crazy Football sounds like another way of talking about ‘Junior Football’
“distancing yourself from this type of behaviour is a positive step for SEO I feel — but that’s not going to make it go away”
Possibly won’t make it go away, but its the only tool we have to try and ostracise those involved.
Ryman – I think part of the reason for such controversy on this topic is that people do see it as “just SEO”. I feel strongly that community need to stand up and challenge this belief though in order to as PoLR says “distance ourselves” and send out the message that it’s just not acceptable behaviour.
I started getting some background info on this subject and stubled upon a Matt Cutts post from nearly a year ago : http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/my-2008-predictions/
This is the part that interests me –
It seems that Matt’s crystal ball was bang on but I don’t like the affiliation with Black Hat – this form of link building is its own break away faction, s’ppose ‘CrapHat’ will do till someone else terms it better.
Part of the problem is a fundamental confusion of 2 brands of “black hat”:
1. There’s the term denoting “crackers, illegal hackers, malevolent code breakers, virus/trojans developers” etc. as used within the IT security community (hence, “Black Hat conferences” dedicated to network and server security issues, identity theft prevention, etc.)
2. “Black Hat SEO” describing search engine optimizers/marketers not feeling bound by the various search engines’ respective terms of service. (Which, of course, are entirely private and don’t reflect the law of the land in any which way, no matter what the search engine spinmeisters may try to convey to the contrary.) This term is obviously restricted to the SEO community.
Whereas the type #1 BHs will typically be breaking the law (depending on particular jurisdiction, of course), run phishing and/or DOS attacks etc., the type 2 (SEO) BHs will do nothing of the kind. (Some may go to the lengths of running XSS injection exploits on unsecure web sites, but whether that is actually an illegal activity depends, again, on jurisdiction and is, hence, subject to a lot of debate.)
For quite a while now, Google’s Matt Cutts has been using the term “black hat” in an entirely ambiguous manner, blithely mixing up the two different meanings and thereby implying that SEO BHs (type #2) are actually criminals and felons.
While he has recently back pedaled a mite (see comments section here: http://sphinn.com/story/103245 ) when confronted with a lot of flak (mainly on Twitter) because of this very FUD policy (a comment, by the way, that actually constitutes an attempted thread hijack as I’ve pointed out there myself), the issue remains that “Matt as Google” has been running an extensive and prolonged campaign to smear the reputation of BH SEOs by insinuating that they’re identical with the same pack of criminals pushing porn links on school sites, etc.
This said, Matt has actually pointed out that the case under discussion here was NOT one of cracking a site’s code or illegally hacking into their system. (He has also expressed his doubts that this was actually an illegal activity…) Seems that the spammer in question merely exploited a dated version of the Moodly platform by implementing porn links there.
Personally, I know of no BH SEOs who would condone pumping porn links to kiddie and school sites, and I find this just as detestible as anyone else.
However, this doesn’t give Mr Cutts (or any other search engine rep for that matter) the right to hoodwink their readers and followers by deliberately creating the impression that BH SEOs are dealing in felonous, illegal activities of any kind: this is pure, unabashedly misleading propaganda of the worst fascistoid kind, period.
Moreover, IMV this does a great disservice to the SEO industry as a whole, i.e. including all the “white hats” as well. Because we cannot really expect our clients to dig into all the fineries and intricacies of what is essentially an industry infight. At the end of the day, it will tarnish ALL of SEO, no matter the color of hat. And knowing Google for the control freaks they are, I am still waiting to be convinced that this isn’t entirely intentional on their part…
@ fantomaster, thanks for sharing your comments on this debate, it is extremely beneficial to have input from every area of the SEO sphere in regards to this topic.
I am of the same view that a continuation of similar attacks can serve no good to the name of SEO as a whole.
I don’t just object, I am outraged that Matt Cutts, of all people, would associate SEO with such criminal behavior–and in my opinion exposing babies to porn is criminal. I have no idea how to hack a site and the idea has never even crossed my mind. It is entirely against my personal code, as is the whole porn thing. I am proud of my profession as an SEO and will defend our integrity aggressively.
I do not think most blackhats would go that far either. That is a good coin phrase though, craphat.
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