Google Pushes Fix for Comment Spam
Google is looking to the past in order to crack down on the increasing problem of comment spam, promoting the adoption of a simple HTML link attribute that tells search engines to ignore its contents. As Web logs continue to proliferate, spammers have taken to filling comment areas with links, which in turns gives them a higher ranking in Web searches.
But now, Google will not give credit to links with the attribute rel="nofollow" when it ranks the popularity of Web sites. The search giant says the additional tag "isn't a negative vote for the site where the comment was posted; it's just a way to make sure that spammers get no benefit from abusing public areas like blog comments, trackbacks, and referrer lists."
Search rivals MSN and Yahoo have announced support for the initiative, as well as makers of blogs, including Six Apart and LiveJournal.
Six Apart hopes that this will be a major step towards ending the comment spam problem that the company itself has admitted was due to bad coding on its part.
TypePad users will have the feature immediately available. LiveJournal says it will also be implementing the link attribute for people who are not "friends." Movable Type users can go to the service's Web site to learn more about the feature and download a plug-in that was made available Wednesday.
Blogs, however, aren't the only location where the attribute will come in handy. Google says it should be used in any software that allows others to add links to an author's site, including guestbooks, trackbacks and referrer lists.
Editor's Note: BetaNews has implemented the "nofollow" link attribute within the comments and review areas.