My site got hacked and now i have 1000s of 404 pages and backlinks. Should i transfer my site to a new domain name and start again?

[KeithWarbyUK]

My site was hacked and I had 1000s of pages that should not exist created and has had 1000s of backlinks put in. Now i have the same pages and backlinks redirecting to 404 pages. Is this why my site crashed out of google and my SEO fixes since have made no progress to my problem?

[WebQuest]

Its not a big problem and there is no need to start on a new domain. In fact, this is common with WordPress websites that are not updated regularly.

I would advise the following:

• Try to identify how did the hack take place - if its WordPress you can install the Sucuri Security (free) plugin that will help identify any compromised files.

• Cleanup the website by deleting all the spam sub-folders & pages.

• Update your WordPress, Theme and all Plugins (if this is a WordPress website).

• You can have a quick fix for all the 404s by submitting a 410 response code for these URLs. This can be done through a number of free redirection plugins on WordPress. If its not a WordPress site, there are a number of other options to get this done too.

Hope that helps.

[Rajesh.Prajapati]

Are you unable to retrieve your site from your server? Is your domain or site hacked?

[paints-n-design]

Its not a problem to have 404-Pages, when they are not linked internally.  High amount of pages pointing to your site sounds like you may have to disavow stuff. If your page is known  long enaugh for search engines, a new domain with equal content will make the problems move to the new domain  (you may can see that happen for dejanseo switching without redirect to dejanmarketing).

Did Google saw the hack and asked you to solve the problem?