Google webmaster tools links

Hello all, I found that my website has a few links in the Google webmasters links section, but these links came from sites with NOFOLLOW attribute while in previous threads I've seen a post that said that Google count backlinks for that, so how is this done ?

 

It's a bit of a mystery, and anyone who claims to have a definitive answer is not to be trusted.
Google consistently says 'nofollow' means exactly that - the links are not followed. But they are in Webmaster tools, so they count for something.
Something to try and pin Matt Cutts down on in a Q&A, I think

 

It is not surprise for me.Although webmaster tools may show the no-follow link,it won't be counted to calculate your link juice.

 

thanks, but there's another nofollow links on blogs that aren't included in the links section in webmaster tools !!!, weird

 

I've asked Cutts about this the last two years at Pubcon. He says:

1) WMT and LINK operator BOTH show only a sample of back links that Google knows about
2) Google doesn't count all back links they know about
3) Google shows not only NOFOLLOW links but also links from sites known to be under penalty in both the LINK: operator and WMT output even though neither of these help from a ranking perspective
4) They do not show all links they know about and that count so that you never know which links they know about and which links they are counting.

Basically they don't want to give you a tool where you can reverse engineer the link dependent portions of their ranking algorithm.

The LINK: operator AND WMT show ONLY a sample of your links... They have NEVER shown all of your links.

 

From what I have read, nofollow links will show up in webmaster tools but like Kittyluver said, they won't give you link juice. Google still uses nofollow links to discover new pages.

 

Thanks for that Canonical - this is a bit odd - "Google shows not only NOFOLLOW links but also links from sites known to be under penalty" - I can understand them not wanting anyone to have the ability to reverse engineer other site's links, but it seems a bit counter-productive for them to not to filter out what they are considering 'spam' links, as it doesn't particularly help webmasters to make 'white hat' decisions about their link building.