How toxic link spam is created

[kumartk]

Link spam can arise in a variety of ways. Since Google became the most successful search engine, website operators have recognized the benefits of spam for achieving better rankings. A variety of keyword- and link-related spam tactics continue to emerge with the goal of manipulating search results.

Even today, a variety of spam tactics can be found online. From December 2020 to December 2021, the number of phishing websites increased by 37% (source: Statista ). The steady proliferation of spam domains or phishing websites is proving to be a problem for approximately 90% of all websites . Spam attacks are, in most cases, the result of cybercrime, targeting thousands of domains simultaneously with automated attacks.

The use of so-called spam bots, which are used for the mass unauthorized copying italy phone number data of web content , is widespread . This tactic extends to systematically spying on software vulnerabilities in servers. Another common practice is so-called website scrapers, which extract the content of third-party websites without obtaining the authors' consent. This results in mass copies of original websites on the web.

Keyword density has long been considered an important evaluation criterion by Google. Therefore, link spammers still try to place a large number of keywords on web pages. This is possible, for example, through invisible text, by using keywords in the alt attributes of images, and by using content farms. Even though Google primarily values ​​high-quality and relevant content, such tactics are still relatively common.

For these reasons, link spam is penalized by Google
Despite numerous updates and changes to the Google algorithm, Google continues to issue penalties. The reasons for these penalties can vary widely. It's not a single toxic link that's responsible for a penalty, but rather a combination of various violations of Google's guidelines . These can include:

User-generated spam can result in penalties. This occurs, for example, through link spam in forum posts and links in profiles and signatures.
If a lot of link spam is distributed in various web directories and link lists , this can also lead to penalties.
General spam that is characterized by the use of keyword stuffing or without any thematic relevance to the page will also be viewed critically and penalized if necessary.
Another risk for penalties are links that have been intentionally hidden , for example text in the color of the background or placing text outside the visible screen area through the use of CSS.
Even very old links can lead to penalties.