Sp*mming Log Files: What will they think of Next?
A few weeks ago, a Tribuner wrote in to me to report a strange occurrence. In her log files, the same site showed up as a referrer, over and over and over again - even though the site didn't have a link to her.
"Lately it seems that I am getting a lot of pages in my logs that don't link to my site."
It turns out that more and more sites, most selling questionable products or material, have begun using this tactic. It's very easy to write scripts that make a certain URL appear as a referrer in the log files of a particular site.
The hope is that the site owners will notice the referrer and clickthrough in order to search for the link to their site... and at this time it looks like there is absolutely nothing that can be done to stop this.
This tactic has also been employed against blog sites which frequently publish a list of "Top 10 Sites That Link to Me" in order of the number of referrers sent.
A few weeks ago, a Tribuner wrote in to me to report a strange occurrence. In her log files, the same site showed up as a referrer, over and over and over again - even though the site didn't have a link to her.
"Lately it seems that I am getting a lot of pages in my logs that don't link to my site."
It turns out that more and more sites, most selling questionable products or material, have begun using this tactic. It's very easy to write scripts that make a certain URL appear as a referrer in the log files of a particular site.
The hope is that the site owners will notice the referrer and clickthrough in order to search for the link to their site... and at this time it looks like there is absolutely nothing that can be done to stop this.
This tactic has also been employed against blog sites which frequently publish a list of "Top 10 Sites That Link to Me" in order of the number of referrers sent.