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February 18, 2005

Google's Answer to Comment Spam

Eron C. left a comment in response to my post Sorry, No Trackbacks Today pointing me to Google's answer to stopping comment spam. Basically, Google says to automatically add the attribute rel="nofollow" to any link automatically generated from a URL entered by a reader (usually through a comment or a trackback). I like this approach, and I'm glad to see that Google stepped up so quickly and confidentially. The idea is not to stop the spam itself (as I've been trying to do), but to stop its effectiveness -- basically, to remove the incentive.

I'd seen this post on the Google Blog a while back, but when I followed Eron's link are re-read the post, I found it had been updated to include an additional 16 blogging applications that now support Google's recommendation for a total of 26 (probably more at this point). Of course, now other search engines have to sign on, as well. I know it's hard to believe, but there are actually other search engines besides Google out there, and according to my access logs, a few people even use them.

Anyway, I will be implementing Google's recommended change in the near future, and I'm wondering how many others have implemented it, as well. I'm speaking specifically of those who host their own blogging software, and either need to hack the code, or update to a new version. Also, has anyone heard of other search engines supporting Google's recommendation?

Posted by cantrell at February 18, 2005 11:51 AM | References

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www.actioncontents.com (a friend's blog)

has implemented the no-follow on his dedicated mt-installation using a mt-plugin (so, no real hacking with mt).

see him posting about it here and start wondering whether this has increased his cspamming-problem ;)

http://www.actioncontents.com/archives/001881.html

Posted by: subHero at February 18, 2005 12:14 PM

I'm dissapointed with the nofollow concept. It presumes that the main reason the blogs get spammed is to increase the spammers page ranking in the search engine. I'm not so sure that's the case.

Since blog spam has an infinite ROI (ie, no cost), I think this approach will actually increase the amount of blog spam as the spammers try to outdo each other.

I like the "type this code" approach better, although it's a bit harder to implement. You know the one, it's where the comment page gives you a code that changes on each page load and is delivered to you in an image. You have to type it in a box in order to post.

Posted by: Mike Rankin at February 18, 2005 12:22 PM

I like CAPTCHA's, but also prefer a secondary measure, registered users or required email address for the comment to be viewed.

When a comment is added, a confirmation email is sent to the person providing the comment. Something along the lines: your comment has been submitted for approval. We also support email confirmation approval. By clicking this link, the comment you posted will be automatically approved.

Kills the anonymous nature of the spammer, which in most cases, will eliminate the spam.

Posted by: Chris Wigginton at February 18, 2005 01:10 PM

CAPTCHAs are a complete no no if you give any consideration to accessibility--which you should.

I like your email approval method though ; )

Posted by: CAPTCHA Killjoy at February 18, 2005 01:52 PM

I'm using nofollow strategy + captcha on a MT 3.15 and I'm very happy. I've disabled trackbacks, and have no intention to place it back.

http://www.cfgigolo.com

[]'s
Alex

Posted by: Alex Hubner at February 18, 2005 02:47 PM

Well, Yahoo signed up, so did MSN. This happened long ago (in internet time).

http://www.ysearchblog.com/archives/000069.html
http://blogs.msdn.com/msnsearch/archive/2005/01/18/nofollow_tags.aspx

My solution to comment spam:

http://manish.revise.org/archives/2004/12/21/fighting-wordpress-spam/

I hate CAPTHA for some reasons, one of them being that it's not friendly to the blind.

Posted by: Manish Jethani at February 18, 2005 04:16 PM

Christian:

(1) MSN has definitely said that they plan to support nofollow... I *believe* Yahoo said something similar, but I won't swear to it.

(2) I finally decided to punt on nofollow. Now that JournURL is officially an aggregator in addition to its other features, any given post in a community can be a comment, a blog entry, or a feed item. Heck, it's theoretically possible for a post to be all three at once.

Deciding the when/where/how of nofollow in such an environment isn't easy, and given that the comment spam horse is well out of the barn, it just doesn't seem to be worth the effort.

Posted by: Roger Benningfield at February 18, 2005 04:34 PM