story first appeared on Search Engine Land
Dan Petrovic has explained how he hijacked a few pages in Google to show his copied version over the original version of the page.
For example, he was able to confuse Google into thinking a page on MarketBizz should really show on dejanseo.com.au instead of on marketbizz.nl.
How did he do it? He simply copied the full page, source code and everything and put it on a new URL on his site. He linked to the page and gave it a +1 and the result worked days later. He is a picture of Google’s search results for the page using an info command and also searching for the title of the page:
He did the same thing on three other domains with varied levels of success.
We emailed Google last week for a comment but have yet to hear back.
In some cases, using a rel=canonical seemed to prevent it from hijacking the result fully but not in all cases. There also seems to be a case where using the authorship might be prevent this as well.
Dan Petrovic was even able to hijack the first result for Rand Fishkin’s name (with Rand’s permission):
The way this seems to work is that Google’s duplicate content system feels that the new URL is the more important page and thus replaces the original page with the more important page. It is how the competitive link trick seemed to have worked as well.
Postscript: Google has taken action against these attempts with a notification sent to the webmaster for “copied content.” Those pages were removed from the index.
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Showing posts with label hack. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hack. Show all posts
Monday, November 19, 2012
Thursday, June 07, 2012
LinkedIn Website Hacked
Story first appeared in USA Today.
In the latest blow to online confidence, the accounts of some users of business-networking site LinkedIn and dating site eHarmony were compromised after users' encrypted passwords were posted on the Internet.
Many of LinkedIn's 161 million members worldwide, who use the site to form professional connections, were also bombarded Wednesday by e-mail from unfamiliar parties urging them to click on links to verify e-mail addresses. LinkedIn and eHarmony join the list of several major websites, including retailer Zappos.com, that were hacked in recent months.
Wednesday's cyberattack on LinkedIn, which affects as many as 6.5 million users, came on the heels of a discovery that LinkedIn's mobile app on Apple devices tracked users' calendar events and synched them to its server without users' knowledge, a practice that could violate Apple's privacy regulations.
The encrypted password hash codes, which can be deciphered to uncover users' passwords, could give the hacker access to users' accounts once the codes are cracked, according to an IDC tech industry analyst.
Some of the passwords that were compromised correspond to LinkedIn accounts, the company confirmed in a blog post on its site Wednesday. In another post, LinkedIn urged users never change your password by following a link in an e-mail, since those links might be compromised and redirect you to the wrong place. The company also said it would send users of the affected accounts instructions on how to reset their passwords and that these instructions would be devoid of any links.
Late Wednesday, eHarmony said the passwords of a "small fraction" of its users had also been compromised. The site, which says it has more than 20 million registered online users, did not say how many had been affected. But tech news site Ars Technica said it found about 1.5 million passwords leaked online that appeared to be from eHarmony users.
It's unclear who was behind the hacking, but several tech analysts encouraged users to change passwords on the sites and create unique passwords for every social-media account. If you have the same password on multiple accounts, change them right now. If the hackers get one password and all of your passwords are the same, they're going to have access to all your information.
The LinkedIn incident underscores the importance of passing data-protection legislation and that it forecasts a shaky future for online consumerism. How many times is this going to happen before Congress finally wakes up and takes action? More people are becoming antsy about providing their personal information online, and that's not good for the future.
In the latest blow to online confidence, the accounts of some users of business-networking site LinkedIn and dating site eHarmony were compromised after users' encrypted passwords were posted on the Internet.
Many of LinkedIn's 161 million members worldwide, who use the site to form professional connections, were also bombarded Wednesday by e-mail from unfamiliar parties urging them to click on links to verify e-mail addresses. LinkedIn and eHarmony join the list of several major websites, including retailer Zappos.com, that were hacked in recent months.
Wednesday's cyberattack on LinkedIn, which affects as many as 6.5 million users, came on the heels of a discovery that LinkedIn's mobile app on Apple devices tracked users' calendar events and synched them to its server without users' knowledge, a practice that could violate Apple's privacy regulations.
The encrypted password hash codes, which can be deciphered to uncover users' passwords, could give the hacker access to users' accounts once the codes are cracked, according to an IDC tech industry analyst.
Some of the passwords that were compromised correspond to LinkedIn accounts, the company confirmed in a blog post on its site Wednesday. In another post, LinkedIn urged users never change your password by following a link in an e-mail, since those links might be compromised and redirect you to the wrong place. The company also said it would send users of the affected accounts instructions on how to reset their passwords and that these instructions would be devoid of any links.
Late Wednesday, eHarmony said the passwords of a "small fraction" of its users had also been compromised. The site, which says it has more than 20 million registered online users, did not say how many had been affected. But tech news site Ars Technica said it found about 1.5 million passwords leaked online that appeared to be from eHarmony users.
It's unclear who was behind the hacking, but several tech analysts encouraged users to change passwords on the sites and create unique passwords for every social-media account. If you have the same password on multiple accounts, change them right now. If the hackers get one password and all of your passwords are the same, they're going to have access to all your information.
The LinkedIn incident underscores the importance of passing data-protection legislation and that it forecasts a shaky future for online consumerism. How many times is this going to happen before Congress finally wakes up and takes action? More people are becoming antsy about providing their personal information online, and that's not good for the future.
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