Hacked Server IP Range Penality?
-
I use a justhost.com reseller account to host about 15-20 of my own websites. None of the sites are related, nor do I interlink or do anything blackhat with any of them. All of the sites have unique content. Some of it isn't great, but I didn't use a writing service on any of then, it was all written by myself.
Recently I found a list of my sites (as well as about 200 others hosted by justhost) on a hacker website that listed the cpanel usernames. I alerted the host and the issue is being fixed. I am changing all of my usernames and passwords for all of the sites.
Anyway, I recently took a look at some analytics and rankings and noticed that I lost a lot of my rankings on a handful of those sites recently. I know there was the big de-indexing of junk blogs recently, but I don't think that is the case. I can still find all of my sites in Google, they are just out of the first 50 results, when a majority of them were ranked from 5-20 in the SERPs.
Here are three of the sites and their phrases:
http://nintendoconsoles.com/ "nintendo consoles" - This domain I bought from someone so there could be some sort of sandbox period for it.
http://webhostingfordrupal.com/ "web hosting for drupal" - This was a new register.
http://seotirical.com "seotirical" - we don't show up, but all of the tweets and links to us do. - This was a new register.
I realize these sites aren't perfect, and might not have been ready for the first page. The Nintendo site is about 3 months old, but the Drupal site has been around for 8+ months. I might try adding a fresh piece of content tonight to see if that helps, but I thought it was curious that it happened across the board with about 5-6 sites on my one reseller account. I don't even know if the top portion of this post has anything to do with the problems, but I thought I'd see if anyone has insight.
Cheers,
Vinnie -
Shane,
Thanks again for the response. I agree those pages aren't the strongest, and don't have a ton of great content. A few of my other sites have more than 2-3 articles, and the content is rich with media.
I guess time and content will tell. If after a few weeks of adding some new content and building a few links nothing has improved, I will start to worry. It just seems shocking that one of my sites that has been holding the 6th position for it's exact match phrase (and has some links/social) dropped completely out of the top 50.
The sites and pages are still indexed, but only come up when you search the exact URL.
Vinnie
-
by hit, do you mean de-indexed or just bumped down aggressively?
Cause the ones you gave seem to be affiliate sites, with thin content, and light design elements, so I can definitely see how these could have been devalued.
Here is the reason I am pretty sure it is not a "Hack Penalty"
First, I am not sure that exists - Google cannot interpret if you have been hacked or not, only if their is malicious intent on your site due to or after the hack.
And as to your password being readily available.. anyone could create a site like this, with passwords, and without google going through each page on the web like this, they would not know if it was real or not. (it is also very easy to brute-force or rainbow a commercial host)
This creates a whole new realm for Google as web avenger, as well as SERP integrity protector.
I am just not sure the password release could be involved.
UNLESS!
A penalty was leveraged against justhosts ENTIRE commercial subnet, due to a issue that was caused due to this password release.
But I do not think you or the sites would be singled out due to the password release, only if something bad enough happened that got Google's attention..
BUT then i believe you would be de-indexed, not de-valued.... (blacklisted)
hopefully this opinion was clear as mud
-
Shane,
Thanks for the input. I agree about securing down the site first. I have checked webmaster tools, and no messages are coming up. No suggestions at all are coming up.
I looked into it a bit more, and it seems like 90% of my sites on that one host were hit, but none of my other sites on different hosts were affected at all. I am gonna try to add a piece of fresh content to each site this week, and maybe get a few social signals. I am not panicking yet, but when I see that 10 sites have all lost all of their rankings (and aren't even showing up for their title tags), it's slightly concerning to me.
-
I believe they are coincidental...
I am not sure Google would take action on the entire Subnet range, for a password breach.
I believe it is only when malicious intent is found or suspected, and the release of passwords was not a malicious act in its own.
Check your Webmaster Tools for Malware messages, and see if there are any other messages. As say, you might have just fell victim to the latest round of quality checks from algorithm - You may have just been bumped -
The idea of first making sure you are protected - then trying to get some fresh content and social signal/links is probably the route I would take.
Shane
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Using GeoDNS across 3 server locations
Hi, I have multiple servers across UK and USA. I have a web site that serves both areas and was looking at cloning my sites and using GeoDNS to route visitors to the closest server to improve speed and experience So UK visitors would connect to UK dedicated server, North America - New York server and so on Is this a good way or would this effect SEO negatively. Cheers Keith
Technical SEO | | Keith-0071 -
Should I get a unique IP?
I have a couple sites hosted in a VPS that share the same IP. Should I assign each site a unique IP? Would Google affect my rankings for a sudden IP change?
Technical SEO | | rlopes5280 -
IP address changed and some rankings drop
I changed my hosting company coz better server hardware and results (google). My website was perfectly for every queries on google but after changing company and ip address some results dropped to second page. What can i do now? These drops caused by changing ip address?
Technical SEO | | umutege0 -
Can I Get Penalized for 301 Redirects (Too Many or In Any Scenario)?
A client of ours owns several domain names that are keyword similar to the domain they actually use to run their site. They are asking us if we should 301 redirect all of these websites to the domain they use. However, I don't want this to work against them and their site get penalized later for this. I have heard buying out competitors and redirecting their domain to yours is frowned upon and penalized when you get caught (they did not do this). We are also wondering if there is a limit as to how many domains you can 301 redirect and what type (keyword similar, misspellings, .net's, etc.) and if you are penalized after too many (i.e. >50). All of the domains in question are keyword/brand name similar only and do not exist as actual websites. We just want to do the right thing. Thank you for your help.
Technical SEO | | JCunningham0 -
Google webmasters showing links from my own IP
Was looking at Google webmasters earlier today and I noticed that links are shown from my own IP address. Really weird. Any clue on how to fix that?
Technical SEO | | EricMoore0 -
Linux Server recognizing ASP Pages (301)
Greeting, I am in the process of 301 a group of pages on our site. We are thinking about switching from ASP to a Linux Server. Question 1. - Would anyone have any information of creating a Sever Spoof so that the Linux Server will recognize asp pages for a 301? Question 2 - How will this style of 301 Effect SEO rankings? Thanks, Tony
Technical SEO | | Tonyd230 -
I am Posting an article on my site and another site has asked to use the same article - Is this a duplicate content issue with google if i am the creator of the content and will it penalize our sites - or one more than the other??
I operate an ecommerce site for outdoor gear and was invited to guest post on a popular blog (not my site) for a trip i had been on. I wrote the aritcle for them and i also will post this same article on my website. Is this a dup content problem with google? and or the other site? Any Help. Also if i wanted to post this same article to 1 or 2 other blogs as long as they link back to me as the author of the article
Technical SEO | | isle_surf0 -
Is IP-Hosting an effective and worthy SEO solution?
I have seen few websites selling same package of IP-Hosting, I consider that kind of smart SEO solution if it really be effective, But I have doubt. I have a few websites using a dedicated server for 6 years with only 1 valid IP and with that experience, I think rich content, title tags and anchor links are most important factors but I never tried such IP SEO, has any one tried IP hosting? Then comes second questions, If you have experienced and recommend IP Hosting, the reasonable application could be wordpress to manage all the sites in diffrent servers, and by using plugins such as autoblog or RSS importer we can update all the sites with minimum effort, But the problem is that neither of these 2 plugins are really working hassle free, They do not work at all or they stop wroking all the sudden, preferably I need a solution for Wordpress multisite Would you offer any alternative? I appreciate if you share your ideas... P.S.: My objective to apply IP hosting is not geo-targeting I use to launch .COMs normally without any particular geo-target.
Technical SEO | | Pooria0