Alexa as a source of referral & search engine spam

That Alexa rankings don’t have much value is a given with experienced webmasters.

With some sites I like to see how the ranking shifts. Just a minor supplement to what I get from AWStats and Webalizer.

People who are thinking about advertising on websites often take the Alexa ranking very seriously. And some of the online ad services incorporate Alexa’s stats in their summary of the sites for whom they are selling ads.

That makes it even easier for Google and other search engines to gulp up the statistics and links.

Referral spammers have caught on to this.

Have you ever wondered why all those poker sites would send so many false referrers when your site’s visitor statistics aren’t visible to the search engines.

The bogus referrals show up in Alexa’s results. Yet another way to get Google to pay attention to your URL.

Some of my sites list a huge number of visitors from gambling sites that don’t link to me.

More search engine spam for the Google, Yahoo, Jeeves and MSN to eventually find a way to filter out.

Surely makes it hard for potential website advertisers to make a decision.

Originally posted 2005-09-04 00:17:30. Republished by Old Post Promoter

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