SpamCon Presentation: Blog Spam
I realized recently I still hadn’t put the blog spam presentation I gave at the MIT Spam Conference in March online. Here it is!
Blog Spam
Jessica Baumgart
MIT Spam Conference
Friday, March 30, 2007
Why am I here?
- Been blogging since 2003
- Seen way too much blog spam
- Leads a local group for bloggers
Some Definitions
- Weblogs - software that enables the ability to quickly update a Web site.
- Blog comments - words people can attach to someone else’s blog post and weblog. Blogs frequently have comments.
- Trackback - one way a server can tell another server someone’s pointing to something on it. Many weblogs display trackbacks.
How Spammers Use Weblogs
- Comment spam
- Trackback spam
- Spam blogs (splogs)
Why Use Weblogs?
- Some search engines rank sites higher based on who links to them. If a site can trick a search engine into thinking they have lots of incoming links from a reputable server, their page rank increases.
Comment Spam
- Some people manually add comment spam to weblogs
- Lots of spam appears courtesy of scripts & other automated attacks
Comment Spam Examples
- “Hey, nice site!” posted multiple times with a URL to something completely unrelated
- “You might find my site interesting” with a URL to something unrelated
- gibberish with links
- Repetitive crazy rants
Trackback Spam
- Lots of bots and scripts and fake server pings
Trackback Spam Examples
- Some medical product sales
Spam Blogs or Splogs
- Spammers and spam bots can set up weblogs on free blog services
- Causes problems for search engines, like Feedster and Technorati
Splogs
- Search for viagra or cialis in one of the weblog search tools and see what happens
Tools
Tools to Control Spam
- Comment moderation
- Trackback moderation
- Server options
- nofollow
How Far Ahead Are Spammers?
- Many spammers seem to be ahead of the tech tools that block spam
- How do we cope with or react to that?
- How can we catch spammers?
Dream Tools to Control Spam
- Image recognition
- Server blocks
- Cans
How bad can blog spam get?
- An anecdote about changs to Harvard’s blog server
Thank You!
After giving the talk, I realized I omitted referer spam. It’s a way for spammers to sneak referers into your log showing who links to your blog to try to trick you into visiting various spam sites.
