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Fake referral traffic

Discussion in 'Google Analytics' started by brealmz, Apr 5, 2015.

  1. #1
    Sorry for my bad English but i have some spamming situation here that i need some advised.

    My website is getting some clicks from google search engine. Lately i noticed some fake referral traffics in google analytics.
    simple-share-buttons.com sometimes are sending fake traffics from different country all at once. I caught it one time in google analytics real time reporting.
    It has started a month ago and i just filtered out in google analytics. but today i thought about it. what is the reason behind all this.

    I compared my google analytics reports to my google webmaster tool report.
    What i have noticed is when they send fake refferal traffic to my website it was completely an opposite thing happening to my google webmaster tool report.
    Both clicks and impressions are dropping when they send spam fake refferal traffics. I am also suspecting that they are making me lose ranking on some keywords so it must stop.

    My questions is how to completely stop it? Any advice will be appreciated.

    Some other domains that sending fake referal traffics are:


    simple-share-buttons.com
    o-o-6-o-o.com
    humanorightswatch.org
    site15.simple-share-buttons.com
    site39.simple-share-buttons.com
    offers.bycontext.com
    www.Get-Free-Traffic-Now.com
    s.click.aliexpress.com

    also some fake referall traffic are coming from addons.mozilla.org with referral path /en-US/firefox/addon/ilovevitaly/.
    I can tell it was fake because it was from Samara Oblast Russia and my target market is Philippines and i am using our local language.
    The traffic from Samara Oblast is different because the average duration is around 10 minutes.
     
    brealmz, Apr 5, 2015 IP
  2. paperaser

    paperaser Peon

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    #2
    This type of spam is becoming more and more prevalent, but luckily there are a few patches (I won't call them fixes, since I'm hoping Google will eventually actually fix the issue).

    In short, there are two types of spammers:
    • Spammy web crawlers, which actually hits your site and whose URL usually leads back to some awful SEO tool (looking at you, Semalt)
    • Ghost referral traffic, which hits Google Analytics servers and bypasses your own (editing .htaccess won't do anything for these guys) and generally leads to an affiliate link

    To learn more about referral spam and how to get rid of it, check out this blog post: http://viget.com/advance/removing-referral-spam-from-google-analytics

    As to your point about Google Webmaster Tools: Stats from analytics will not impact any search ranking -- at least not according to Google, which is explained in more detail by Matt Cutts here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=56&v=CgBw9tbAQhU
     
    paperaser, Apr 5, 2015 IP
    brealmz likes this.
  3. kjh-08

    kjh-08 Well-Known Member

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    #3
    Block their IP's from accessing your site. Long time ago Russia was bad about this, so I blocked all Russian IP's.
     
    kjh-08, Apr 5, 2015 IP
  4. Sam Marley

    Sam Marley Greenhorn

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    #4
    This is Referral Spam and currently there is no proper way to stop this spam. But, you can filter those websites in Google Analytics and stop referral traffic coming from those spammy websites.
     
    Sam Marley, Apr 8, 2015 IP
  5. Carloseo

    Carloseo Peon

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    #5
    Try the valid hostname filter in this article What is Referrer Spam and How to Stop it
     
    Carloseo, Apr 8, 2015 IP
  6. Michaela Kennedy

    Michaela Kennedy Active Member

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    #6
    Thanks guys for a very helpful thread.
     
    Michaela Kennedy, Apr 10, 2015 IP
  7. Jeffr2014

    Jeffr2014 Active Member

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    #7
    This referral spam causes a lot of headache for everyone. Unfortunately, all possible actions are either to update .htaccess (which doesn't help with ghost referral traffic) or setting filters in GA, which is absolutely useless - it just removes this traffic from your reports but it is still there for Google to analyze and act upon. Matt Cutts may claim that this traffic doesn't hurt you, but it will take a major change in Google algorithms to disregard these as "universal spammers". Why bother? When this traffic affects everyone to the same degree, the best course of action for Google... to do nothing and treat these as "regular" spam links.
     
    Jeffr2014, Apr 10, 2015 IP
  8. Carloseo

    Carloseo Peon

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    #8
    Sorry didn't put the link http://www.ohow.co/what-is-referrer-spam-how-stop-it-guide/
     
    Carloseo, Apr 13, 2015 IP
  9. Nick008

    Nick008 Peon

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    #9
    all this spam is just to force you to visiting spammy websites (making money on visits?Who knows) and it not affects your website or statistics in bad way. It even not visiting your website (no point to block in htaccess, javascript or other way). Just block'em in google analytics.

    How to do it for referrals: Go to>admin>all filters>new filter. Type any name>choose Custom>Filter field:Referral>Filter Pattern:copy website name>Apply Filter to Views:Add all you have. Do it for all spammy referrals is only way. And it is not obligate to do if you can simply ignore it
     
    Nick008, Apr 15, 2015 IP
  10. Blesta.Store

    Blesta.Store Active Member

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    #10
    Doesn't always work I've got loads of lists and they still pop up on it. I have allot because you are limited to 100 characters per filter.
     
    Blesta.Store, Apr 20, 2015 IP
  11. Nick008

    Nick008 Peon

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    #11
    Not sure I understad you right, but just in case - each referral site must be in a new filter. I have around 20 filters at the moment. And no one is more than 30 scharacters.
    Remember it is only for referrals

    You can try to do another way filter: admin>all filetrs>new filter. Filter name:any you want>choose: Predefined>under that choose these 3:Exclude - traffic from the ISP domain - that end with>ISP Domain:copy here website name>flag case-sensitive>Apply Filter to Views:Add all you have

    I cannot remove from statistics only one www.Get-Free-Traffic-Now.com, but I didn't try yet to write it in lowercase only
     
    Nick008, Apr 20, 2015 IP
  12. usasportstraining

    usasportstraining Notable Member

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    #12
    You can normally block IP via your webhost control panel. You even block an entire range of IPs.
     
    usasportstraining, Apr 23, 2015 IP
  13. Blesta.Store

    Blesta.Store Active Member

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    #13
    That's if they are "physically" visiting the site, referrer spam is fake and nothing touches your site they are targeting the Google Analytics.
     
    Blesta.Store, Apr 24, 2015 IP
  14. qwikad.com

    qwikad.com Illustrious Member Affiliate Manager

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    #14
    qwikad.com, Apr 26, 2015 IP
  15. Jeffr2014

    Jeffr2014 Active Member

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    #15
    I tend to disagree and here is the proof. This is the message I found in my Apache error log today:
    [Sat Apr 25 15:45:04.749256 2015] [core:error] [pid 26161] [client 201.230.196.53:1488] AH00124: Request exceeded the limit of 10 internal redirects due to probable configuration error. Use 'LimitInternalRecursion' to increase the limit if necessary. Use 'LogLevel debug' to get a backtrace., referer: buttons-for-your-website.com
    So they obviously DO visit your site :mad:

    (The actual reason for this error is unrelated to the thread topic and it's my configuration mishap, hopefully it will be resolved by adding "RewriteCond %{ENV:REDIRECT_STATUS} 200" to vhost.conf...)
     
    Jeffr2014, Apr 26, 2015 IP
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  16. scott_r

    scott_r Greenhorn

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    #16
    I've been getting hit from the same social-buttons website. Not terribly annoying, but a bit of a nuisance. One day they sent nearly a thousand fake hits my way. I'm very curious to know WHY this happens. How are they actually making money from sending this fake traffic to my blog that has no ads on it?
     
    scott_r, Apr 27, 2015 IP
  17. brealmz

    brealmz Well-Known Member

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    #17
    today i noticed a spam in organic search traffic with keywords "vitaly rules google ☆*:.。.゚゚・*ヽ(^ᴗ^)丿*・゚゚.。.:*☆ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯(•ิ_•ิ)(ಠ益ಠ)(ಥ‿ಥ)(ʘ‿ʘ)ლ(ಠ_ಠლ)( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ヽ(゚д゚)ノʕ•̫͡•ʔᶘ ᵒᴥᵒᶅ(=^. .^=)oo"
    It was coming from samara, russia.
    anyone experienced a spam in organic traffic before?

    I am sure that whoever doing this got a plenty of time and resources on his hand and I am hoping it will all gone to waste.
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2015
    brealmz, Apr 27, 2015 IP
  18. Mike Sullivan

    Mike Sullivan Peon

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    #18
    There are two types of referral spammers - one (like buttons-for-website and semalt) use crawlers that visit your site. They can be blocked.

    The other injects direct into Google Analytics tracking servers. They must be filtered in GA. All of this second group can be easily filtered with ONE filter -- including ONLY your valid hostname. That spam will never bother you again. Read the section on Ghost Referrals:
    http://www.analyticsedge.com/2014/12/removing-referral-spam-google-analytics/
     
    Mike Sullivan, Apr 28, 2015 IP
  19. Mr.Dog

    Mr.Dog Active Member

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    #19
    I am also getting a ton of junk traffic from dozens of URL's. I applied DISAVOW on them, but I doubt this will work, as it will have zero effect on the traffic, but might help in the SERPs.

    Are these tonnes of spammy links affecting out SERPs?

    SEMALT is sending junk traffic to me as well.

    If I want to edit my .htaccess - what do I have to do? How do I actually block their IP's there (and where do I get the IP's from - the IP addresses of their site?)?
     
    Mr.Dog, May 2, 2015 IP
  20. johnlewisguys

    johnlewisguys Greenhorn

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    #20
    I faced the similar problem with Google Analytics in the end of 2013. Since then I've shifted to Gostats and the problem was gone. You can try it too, it is better than google analytics in many of the ways.
     
    johnlewisguys, May 8, 2015 IP