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This is a cleanup process regarding an effort to spam links by disguising them as dead link replacements.

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam#SEO, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam#Spamming, and Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive267#SEO_spam_attack for previous discussions. Please start new discussions regarding this on this page.

Background[edit]

It was discovered that certain individuals are utilizing ((Dead link)) templates to add spam links for SEO purposes, probably after following guides like this. They try to disguise the addition of spam links by replacing or adding to dead link templates with links to their website. Such spam links can take the form of a direct link to the site or a link to a fake or delayed news article about the uncited statement (Example). Users often include edit summaries with "dead link", "edited link", "replaced dead link" or similar.

Ladsgroup has conducted a search for dead link removals over the past 3 months, the results of which can be found at User:Ladsgroup/spam. Keep in mind that this search will have only found those times when the dead link template was removed, which does not always occur. A filter is tracking this tactic at Special:AbuseFilter/711.

Report[edit]

Indicators
Reports completed:
 Done
no No action
 Stale
Defer discussion:
 Defer to XLinkBot
 Defer to Local blacklist
 Defer to Global blacklist
 Defer to Abuse filter
Information:
 Additional information needed
information Note:

Please use === Descriptive section name === when reporting.

Finds so far

This is a list of accounts and websites which have already been reported (mostly from the above discussions), I'm adding them here to help centralise the reports. Sam Walton (talk) 12:56, 24 December 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Nikon

Spammer

Stewart5235 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · blacklist hits · AbuseLog · what links to user page · count · COIBot · user page logs · x-wiki · status · Edit filter search · Google · StopForumSpam) (Not blocked)

Domain

riflescopereviewsguide.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Wikipedia: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

Copied from WT:WPSPAM. — Revi 13:08, 24 December 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Additional users

Tentative title - haven't investigated individual links. Possibly unrelated.

-C759 (talk) 14:08, 27 December 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Discussion[edit]

Please leave you comment at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/Dead link spamming. — Revi 04:31, 25 December 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

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