Black Hat Manipulation - Violating the Internet Search Engine Process:
Reputation Management, Series #4
by
John Daab Ph.D., for Fine Art Registry®
Background
In an earlier article it was noted that some art galleries and auction houses engage in systemic malfeasance through the use of various structures to deceive the indifferent and trusting consumer. Selling what has been described as "crap" art or art of questionable authenticity for inflated prices and then refusing returns when the duped consumer wants to return the purchased item, such galleries stone wall, engage in bringing SLAPP suits against the customer, remove the critical consumer from the sales area, and file defamation suits against anyone providing information about such activities. The significant thrust of the past article was that such activities are not accidental or happen by chance but are part of a paradigm or process model to stifle criticism in order to maintain corporate revenue and profits. This article examines black hating another aspect of the model: using the Internet search engine process to redirect internet searches away from information about the level of a given company's malfeasant behavior to other websites owned by corrupt company.
Introduction
Thirty years ago the research process consisted of going to the library grabbing a few books or articles, sitting at a desk and reading up on a certain topic. This process was time consuming as the research required traveling from home to the library, locating the materials in the Dewey Decimal System, and walking around the shelves to secure the materials. It could also be expensive if some of the materials had to be copied. Nowadays the research process takes place via a computer. It is convenient, quick, and inexpensive. In the past the research process was student or writer driven. Today everyone researches except the research process is now called surfing and almost everyone with a computer does some surfing whether to develop an article, research paper, or to discover the latest news. More importantly our current research activities are able to provide much information about products and services offered to consumers. With lightening speed, a given product may be given a thumbs up or thumbs down. Corporations are keenly aware of how Internet information may be a threat to their products and services and a benefit in selling their wares. Some have taken steps to prevent negative Internet information from reaching the surfer or researcher, and at the same time, provide data reflecting the value of what they are selling. They are able to control this information by manipulating the Internet search process. To understand how this manipulation is done, it is necessary to understand search engines.
Search Engines
Google, Dogpile, Alta Vista, and Lycos are Internet search engines used to gather information about a particular word - "keyword" - topic, or phrase. What one types into a browser will come back as information specifically, or in a cluster of information. For example, if Fine Art Registry® (FAR®) is typed into the Google browser it will come back as the first result of thousands of results. Fine Art Registry will be the first and as one scrolls down the page there will be additional information tagged on to FAR, e.g. Fine Art Registry and Forensics, Fine Art Registry and Featured Artists, and so on. The actual quantity of web sites associated with the keyword does not always match the projected quantity found at the top of the first page of results. The information provided by the various web sites is presented as a result or results of the item being searched. The results of a given search can be millions, one, or none. The returned results or web page hits match, come fairly close to the keyword, or fail to provide relevant information. You type in cat and receive an ad for a virus protection program.
Search Engines and Their Processes and Rules
Search engines periodically send out spiders and bots which are computer type programs to find new information and check present information on the Internet. New information is indexed so that appropriate results match keyword searches. Results which violate search engine standards are reported back to the search engine managers who decide how such violations will be processed. Results or web pages are also reevaluated for better indexing so that keywords and hits match more closely. If your keyword does not match the results the search engine provides it is more than likely due to indexing problems or violations of the search engine rules.
Search engines have standards and rules allied with providing genuine information, for the most part, and penalties for providing deceptive data. Abiding by the rules allow web sites to continue in a given search engine process; not abiding by the rules places the web site in jeopardy since the search engine owner e.g. Google, may remove the web site listing from the search domain preventing researchers or surfers from garnering the information or products found on the web site. For some no hits means no revenue and ultimately no business.
Manipulation of Website Addresses
Website addresses, URLs, are the results provided when keywords or phrases are typed into a browser. www.fineartregistry.com is the website URL for Fine Art Registry. According to the first results page from aol.com search there are 131000 possible hits associated with this phrase. An additional note about the phrase fineartregistry is that it is a domain name which is copyrighted. It belongs to the owners of fineartregistry and no one else may use without permission except those willing to break the law or be penalized by the search engine providing the results. The interesting point is that some galleries and auction houses decided that law or no law they were going manipulate accessing the FAR website by adding a tag to the site redirecting keyword searches of Fine Art Registry to the site of the malfeasant company. In point, the company used the copyrighted name without permission. As the result of doing so the gallery/auction was brought to court and the finding of the court was that the malfeasant company violated the law.
Besides violating copyright laws the malfeasant company engaged in URL redirecting which "...is taking the user to another page without his or her intervention" (Wiki 2010). The way this is accomplished is by adding the keyword URL name to the redirected URL. Thus, if a website is providing information about a company engaging in acts potentially considered as fraudulent or violations of the law, the nefarious company tags the URL to their URL address/website and the researcher is taken to the violating company's website and given a mouthful of spin about how bad the reporting site is and how wonderful the malfeasant site is.
Redirection of URLs is against the standards of search engines in general simply because the violating URL is deceiving the researcher by providing content not requested. The researcher wants X content, but is given Y which he did not request. In essence, the researcher was given spam. The penalty if discovered is really insignificant since the search engine may or may not remove the guilty URL. Even if the URL is removed the company merely has to clean its website remove the material from its site and request to have its site restored.
Comments
Researchers and surfers have a right to be provided with matched content to their keywords and phrases. Search engines respect that right by constantly monitoring website content. Deceptive content copyright violations, or URL redirecting are violations of search engine protocols and law. One may reasonably argue that such activities may constitute a variation of SLAPP acts and as such violate First Amendment rights of accessing information (ALA, 2009). Manipulation of website access by whatever means should be looked upon as an attempt by the manipulating party to hide information detrimental to the party activating the manipulation. Such dirty deeds added to an already identified system and structures of malfeasance only makes it more clear that the company engaging in such processes is out to protect its revenue at any cost.
1. Black Hat or Black Hating refers to a search engine process whereby the webmaster of a given website sets up a given site not to provide valid information but to deceive researchers attempting to secure information. Black Hat search engine optimization is customarily defined as techniques which deceive, fail to deliver results chosen by the user and does not obtain a good user experience. Retrieved on October 15, 2010 from http://websearch.about.com/od/seononos/a/spamseo.html
2. ALA (2010).Access to Digital Information, Services, and Networks. Retrieved on October 15, 2010 from
http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/intfreedom/librarybill/interpretations/accessdigital.cfm
3. Wiki (2010). SEO Optimization. Retrieved on October 15, 2010 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_optimization.
— by John Daab Ph.D.
| November 5, 2010
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