Online Form Spam




  • Doug G.

    This is a search engine optimization ploy. Since Google ranks search results in part by the number of sites that link to them, sites will try to boost their rankings by spamming their URL on blog sites. Blogs are a good target by their nature since they allow comments. They are counting on the assumption that Google doesn't differentiate blog comments from blog entries, which means it looks to Google as if you, the blog owner, linked to their site, boosting their rankings in search results. So, when someone does actually search for Viagra on Google, their site would be listed near the top.

    Google presumably is aware that this trickery is going on, but I don't know how quickly they are responding to it, if at all.

  • Matt

    Most likely they're just running around the blogosphere at random following links and filling out forms. It's easier to write a script that fills out every form with spam than it is to write a script which looks for the forms which appear to be for comment submissions and only fills out those.

    If you're posting comment spam, you are by definition incapable of regard for the integrity of other people's databases. So why should you expend extra effort in order to preserve inviolate one class of database while merrily polluting another?

    Just like if you're the kind of person who would go into a museum, spray-paint grafitti on the paintings, and urinate on the statues, it's unlikely you'd single out one or two particular artists whose work should be spared.