URL Spoof Issue in Search Results
-
Hello!
We could use some assistance diagnosing an issue. In order to avoid asking a convoluted question, I will try to break it down below:
1. A random foreign site is hacked and a subdirectory is added that is completely irrelevant to the root.
a). i.e. http://www.um.org/prom_dresses/
2. http://www.um.org/prom_dresses/ is just a phishing prom dress page
3. When you search "prom dress shop", the website that used to rank first (for good reason) was www.promdressshop.com.
4. www.promdressshop.com's home page has now been replaced by: um.org/prom_dresses/ – who is using prom dress shop's title tag and meta description.
How is it possible that this hacked page (on um.org) is not only ranking above us, but is also starting to replace www.promdressshop.com's pages in search results. We do not believe www.promdressshop.com has been hacked but are open to any ideas.
Please let me know if you would like any additional info. Thanks in advance!
-
Thank you for your response! We have combed through the code and server activity and there has been nothing changed recently (that we have noticed thus far). However, we will definitely keep you updated.
Thanks!
-
Thank you for the response! We have considered some of these angles but it has been tough to pinpoint the issue. It looks like our spam report took care of it for now but we will keep you guys updated. This is also happening to some competitors so we are all leaning toward this being a serious case of black hat SEO.
Thanks again!
-
Ok, so, my view on this.
In response to livecam's comment, __VIEWSTATE (the code he was refering too) is a base64 encoded form field used in ASP.net to hold data. Its probably not malicous in this instance. see this: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1350216/what-does-the-viewstate-hold
For me, when i search "prom dress shop" in an incognito chrome window, i dont see either entry on the front page of google, though i expect this is because im searching from the UK.
Reviewing the pages specifically, i can make a couple of suggestions.
- Check your web.conf file, your main domain may have been hacked and this adjusted to send only search engine to um.org (to hide the hack)
- it may be that um.org has used Black Hat SEO technique's to massivly raise its profile, this will be short term as google will slap them with loads of penalties pretty quickly.
- Check your web server specifically for viruses etc. Being an ASP.net site, you'll be hosted on a windows server, running IIS. It will be just as prone to viruses as your windows PC at home (without the proper protection).
If you would like a hand to check your site code specifically, drop me a PM and we can see what we can do. Otherwise, if you have in house developers, they should be able to take a look.
-
Did you check page source codes of promdressshop.com ? When i check (ctrl+u) I see there is a large code structure. Usually this is not normal. This encrypted code and It may be embedded malicious code.
And search engines can be described this code as harmful.
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
-
Google Image Search - Is there a way to influence the related icons at the top of the image search results?
Google recently added related icons at the top of the image search results page. Some of the icons may be unrelated to the search. Are there any best practices to influence what is positioned in the related image icons section? Thank you.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JaredBroussard1 -
URL construction in 2014
Hey guys, I was wondering if you could tell me your thoughts about how a URL is perceived by the algo in 2014? For example: http://www.moneyexpert.com/reviews/credit-cards/amex-platinum/ and lets say http://www.moneyexpert.com/reviews_credit-cards_review_amex-platinum.html In the eyes of google do both different style of url generally help google understand the same result? or will the keyword rich html url have a bigger benefit? I am looking forward to your advice on this matter. I don't plan on doing a lot of SEO but rather letting nature take its course so to speak... so i just wanted to make sure i construct this site with 'best practice'.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | irdeto0 -
ECommerce search results to noindex?
Hi, To avoid duplicated content and the possibility of thousands additional pages to an ecommerce website would it be a reasonable solution to have the page as a no-index, would this benefit the site? Thanks **Lantec **
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Lantec0 -
Urls in Bilingual websites
1-I have a bilingual website. Suppose that I am targeting a page for keyword "book" and I have included it in that page url for the English version: English version: www.abc.com/book Can I use the translation of "book" in the second language of the website url instead of "book" ? Please let me know which of the following urls are right " French Verison: www.abc.com/fr/book or www.abc.com/fr/livre livre=Book in French 2- Does Google have any tool to check if the second language page of the website has exactly the same content as the English version. What I want to do is for example for a certain page in English version, my targeted keyword is "book" . So my content would be around books. But in the French version of this page, I want to focus on keyword "Pencil" in French instead of "book". Is it wrong or any consequences? That was the main reason for the question number one. Because if it is ok to do what I explained in item 2 then I will set my urls like: In English : www.abc.com/book In French: www.abc.com/fr/crayon crayon=Pencil in French
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AlirezaHamidian0 -
Index, Nofollow Issue
We are having on our site a couple of pages that we want the page to be indexed, however, we don't want the links on the page to be followed. For example url: http://www.printez.com/animal-personal-checks.html. We have added in our code: . Bing Webmaster Tools, is telling us the following: The pages uses a meta robots tag. Review the value of the tag to see if you are not unintentionally blocking the page from being indexed (NOINDEX). Question is, is the page using the right code as of now or do we need to do any changes in the code, if so, what should we use for them to index the page, but not to follow the links on the page? Please advise, Morris
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PrintEZ0 -
Google tagged URL an overly-dynamic URL?
I'm reviewing my campaign, and spotted the overly-dynamic URL box showing a few links. Reviewing it, they are my Google Tagged URLs (utm_source, utm_medium_utm_campaign etc) I've turned some internal links to Google Tagged URLs but should these cause concern?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Bio-RadAbs0 -
How important is it to canonicalize mobile URLs to desktop URLs?
I know many SEO's prefer a stylesheet and single URL, but if you use m.domain.com, do you canonicalize to your desktop URLS?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0 -
How to fix issues regarding URL parameters?
Today, I was reading help article for URL parameters by Google. http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=1235687 I come to know that, Google is giving value to URLs which ave parameters that change or determine the content of a page. There are too many pages in my website with similar value for Name, Price and Number of product. But, I have restricted all pages by Robots.txt with following syntax. URLs:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CommercePundit
http://www.vistastores.com/table-lamps?dir=asc&order=name
http://www.vistastores.com/table-lamps?dir=asc&order=price
http://www.vistastores.com/table-lamps?limit=100 Syntax in Robots.txt
Disallow: /?dir=
Disallow: /?p=
Disallow: /*?limit= Now, I am confuse. Which is best solution to get maximum benefits in SEO?0