Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
How to check if a site is doing blackhat SEO?
-
Thanks in advance!
-
It really depends on what you define as blackhat. On-page trickery (cloaking, redirects for search engines bots, etc.) can be discovered by browsing as a search bot, digging into code, viewing caches, etc. Danny Sullivan and Rand uncovered a large amount of cloaked (and stolen) content on stage at SMX Sydney a few years ago. It was quite entertaining at the time
Some people are basic enough to use tactics like hidden, white-on-white text, as Martijn says. I'm yet to see that tactic actually working post-2004 though
If it's links they're using, the easiest way is to use a tool like Open Site Explorer, Ahrefs or similar to check the links out. Sneaky people can block the OSE / Ahrefs / MajesticSEO bots from crawling the sources of their backhat links if they have access to the linking sites. You can block the bots either in robots.txt or by rejecting the visits to stop the bots from noting that the links exist. That way, the backlink analysis tools will never see that blackhatsite.com links to rankingsite.com, and so forth. It takes a big network that the spammer controls to block link research tools' bots' access to every link you build, however, so this isn't too common.
Whether all big brands / well ranked sites are using blackhat tactics pretty much depends on your definition of blackhat, but it's certainly true that it is very hard if not impossible to rank top 3 for competitive terms (car insurance, poker, credit cards) without parting with money that results in links being built. This doesn't mean that they're all buying links, but they're definitely investing in marketing that results in links, and the whitest of the whitehats will say that this is technically not organic, natural link development. It is, however, what we do - marketing.
-
Why does it matter?
-
An even easier way is to check their rankings - if they're top 3 for big money terms in their niche, they're probably using some blackhat tactics. Even the whitest of whitehats are still using some blackhat tactics in the background, despite people not wanting to admit it.
-
I can't agree more with Gary, we probably need some more information to know what kind of black hat you're possibily dealing with. One of the first things I tend to look at trying to find out if the site is using some ways of black hat tactics are:
- Backlink profile, if the quality of links is low or certain percentages between follow/ nofollow links are different then it could be a sign.
- Look at the site with Google as a user agent and see if the site is showing different information then to a real user.
- Just do a select all on the site to see if they hide any content (yup, still happens).
-
Your question is a bit to open ended, what do you want to achieve by knowing this information.
Does a site rank better than you?
Are they doing negative seo to other people?
Do they steal content from people?Are they building links as dofollow from places they should not?Too many questions to ask before answering such a vague answer.
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
-
Is domain redirection a good method for SEO?
I have a question and need suggestion from you guys. I’ve searched for my question on Google but don’t get exact information what I need. Maybe I can’t search perfectly.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | kamishah
Let me explain my confusion:
I’ve checked backlink profile of a website. He is not using his main domain while doing comment backlink. He put his another domain while doing comment backlink. The another domain redirect to the main domain. Why he use another domain while doing comment backlink?
Is it helpful to get better rank on Google? For example: My Main Domain = solutionfall.com
Another Domain= xyz.com (It redirect to solutionfall.com)
He just uses xyz.com while doing comment backlink. Thank You so much1 -
My indexed site URL removed from google search without get any message or Manual Actions???
On Agust 2 or 3.. I'm not sure about the exact date...
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | newwaves
The main URL of my website https://new-waves.net/ had been completely removed from Google search results! without getting any messages or Manual Actions on search console ?? but I'm still can find some of my site subpages in search results and on Google local maps results when I tried to check it on google
info:new-waves.net >> no results
site:new-waves.net >> only now I can see the main URL in results because I had submitted it again and again to google but it might be deleted again today or tomorrow as that happen before last few days
100% of all ranked keywords >> my site URL new-waves.net had been completely removed from all results! but I'm still can see it on maps on some results I never get any penalties to my site on Google search console. I noticed some drops on some keywords before that happens (in June and July) but it all of it was related to web design keywords for local Qatar, but all other keywords that related to SEO and digital marketing were not have any changes and been on top My site was ranked number 1 on google search results for "digital marketing qatar" and some other keywords, but the main URL had been removed from 100% of all search results. but you can still see it on the map only. I just tried to submit it again to Google and to index it through google search console tool but still not get any results, Recently, based on google console, I found some new links but I have no idea how it been added to links of my website:
essay-writing-hub.com - 9,710
tiverton-market.co.uk - 252
facianohaircare.com - 48
prothemes.biz - 44
worldone.pw - 2
slashdot.org - 1
onwebmarketing.com - 1 the problem is that all my high PR real links deleted from google console as well although it still have my site link and it could be recognized by MOZ and other sites! Can any one help to know what is the reason?? and how can I solve this issue without losing my previous ranked keywords? Can I submit a direct message to google support or customer service to know the reason or get help on this issue? Thanks & Regards0 -
White H1 Tag Hurting SEO?
Hi, We're having an issue with a client not wanting the H1 tag to display on their site and using an image of their logo instead. We made the H1 tag white (did not deliberately hide with CSS) and i just read an article where this is considered black hat SEO. https://www.websitemagazine.com/blog/16-faqs-of-seo The only reason we want to hide it is because it looks redundant appearing there along with the brand name logo. Does anyone have any suggestions? Would putting the brand logo image inside of an H1 tag be ok? Thanks for the help
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AliMac261 -
Preventing CNAME Site Duplications
Hello fellow mozzers! Let me see if I can explain this properly. First, our server admin is out of contact at the moment,
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | David-Kley
so we are having to take this project on somewhat blind. (forgive the ignorance of terms). We have a client that needs a cname record setup, as they need a sales.DOMAIN.com to go to a different
provider of data. They have a "store" platform that is hosted elsewhere and they require a cname to be
sent to a custom subdomain they set up on their end. My question is, how do we prevent the cname from being indexed along with the main domain? If we
process a redirect for the subdomain, then the site will not be able to go out and grab the other providers
info and display it. Currently, if you type in the sales.DOMAIN.com it shows the main site's homepage.
That cannot be allow to take place as we all know, having more than one domain with
exact same content = very bad for seo. I'd rather not rely on Google to figure it out. Should we just have the cname host (where its pointing at) add a robots rule and have it set to not index
the cname? The store does not need to be indexed, as the items are changed almost daily. Lastly, is an A record required for this type of situation in any way? Forgive my ignorance of subdomains, cname records and related terms. Our server admin being
unavailable is not helping this project move along any. Any advice on the best way to handle
this would be very helpful!0 -
How would you optimize a new site?
Hi guys, im here to ask based on your personal opinion. We know in order to rank in SEO for a site is to make authority contents that interest people. But what would you do to increase your ranking of your site or maybe a blog post? leaving your link on blogs comment seem dangerous, nowadays. Is social media the only way to go? Trying to get people to write about you? what else can be done?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | andzon0 -
Site dropped suddenly. Is it due to htaccess?
I had a new site that was ranking on the first page for 5 keywords. My site was hacked recently and I went through a lot of trouble to restore it. Last night, I discovered that my site was nowhere to be found but when i searched site: mysite.com, it was still ranking which means it was not penalized. I discovered the issue to be a .htaccess and it have been resolved. My question is now that the .htaccess issue is resolved , will my site be restored back to the first page? Is there additional things that i should do? I have notified google by submitting my site
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | semoney0 -
Off-page SEO and link building
Hi everyone! I work for a marketing company; for one of our clients' sites, we are working with an independent SEO consultant for on-page help (it's a large site) as well as off-page SEO. Following a meeting with the consultant, I had a few red flags with his off-page practices – however, I'm not sure if I'm just inexperienced and this is just "how it works" or if we should shy away from these methods. He plans to: guest blog do press release marketing comment on blogs He does not plan to consult with us in advance regarding the content that is produced, or where it is posted. In addition, he doesn't plan on producing a report of what was posted where. When I asked about these things, he told me they haven't encountered any problems before. I'm not saying it was spam-my, but I'm more not sure if these methods are leaning in the direction of "growing out of date," or the direction of "black-hat, run away, dude." Any thoughts on this would be crazy appreciated! Thanks, Casey
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | CaseyDaline0 -
Ever seen a black hat SEO hack this sneaky?
A friend pointed out to me that a University site had been hacked and used to gain top Google rankings. But it was cloaked so that most users wouldn't notice the hack. Only Googlebot and visitors from Google SERPs for the spam keywords would see a hacked version. See http://www.rypmarketing.com/blog/122-how-hackers-gained-an-easy-1-google-ranking-using-a-university-website.whtml (my blog) for screenshot and specifics. I've dealt with hacks before, but nothing this evil and sneaky. Ever seen anything like this? This is not our client, but was just curious if others had seen a hack like this before.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AdamThompson0