Ordinary Gweilo

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WTF?

Some moron is sending me a large number of trackbacks linked to non-existent sites.  What’s the point of that? 

UPDATE: Someone has kindly posted a link to another blogger who has had the same problem and apparently understands what it’s all about.  It seems that these morons are testing a new script, and presumably they’ll be back later with links to real website addresses.  Typepad addressed the comment spam problem by making the links indirect and therefore useless for fooling Google, so I hope they have something planned for this as well. 

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5 responses to “WTF?”

  1. BWG avatar
    BWG

    That’s called referrer spam.

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  2. Andrew avatar
    Andrew

    Here’s a bit more info on the recent case:
    http://stupidevilbastard.com/index/seb/comments/trackback_spammers_are_testing_a_new_script/

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  3. shaky avatar
    shaky

    I don’t think it is referrer spam, they are entries in your http logs right? This is trackback spam, where the spammer calls your trackback script directly. I had a couple of gibberish TBs then the next day got nailed by a load of awful pr0n links. I had to delete my TB script until I (or more likely, someone else) figure out a way to stop it.

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  4. Chris avatar
    Chris

    I confess that I don’t understand how Trackbacks work, but I think you are correct!

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  5. BWG avatar
    BWG

    You’re right. Ref spam was the first thing that popped into mind.
    Either way, it’s just another way dickheads are annoying the rest of us.
    Luckily I use neither comments nor trackbacks on my site.

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