SEO campaign with malware
Posted: Wed Feb 12, 2025 9:57 am
A report by cybersecurity researchers Sucuri claims that hackers are carrying out a massive Black Hat SEO campaign that compromises nearly 15,000 websites .
According to experts, the campaign was first observed in September 2022, when the team detected an increase in malware on several sites running on the WordPress content management system.
How do attackers operate?
Cybercriminals modify WordPress files to inject list of us mobile number database redirects to fake Q&A discussion forums .
The infected or modified files contain malicious code that checks whether website visitors are logged in to WordPress and, if they are not, redirects them to theHowever, the user will not see an image, but clicking on it triggers a computer code that redirects them to a promoted site.
While the experts were able to understand how the attack worked, they were unable to identify how the attackers managed to breach the security of the sites. However, they suspect that the hackers investigated and detected vulnerable plugins or brute-forced the WordPress administrator password .
Black Hat SEO Malware WordPress
Black Hat SEO Campaign Hypothesis
According to Sucuri, the goal of the campaign is to generate enough indexed pages to increase the authority of the sites and, as a result, rank better in search engines .
In other words, this malicious practice is likely to improve performance metrics in Google's index with the aim of increasing rankings in the results .
According to experts, the campaign was first observed in September 2022, when the team detected an increase in malware on several sites running on the WordPress content management system.
How do attackers operate?
Cybercriminals modify WordPress files to inject list of us mobile number database redirects to fake Q&A discussion forums .
The infected or modified files contain malicious code that checks whether website visitors are logged in to WordPress and, if they are not, redirects them to theHowever, the user will not see an image, but clicking on it triggers a computer code that redirects them to a promoted site.
While the experts were able to understand how the attack worked, they were unable to identify how the attackers managed to breach the security of the sites. However, they suspect that the hackers investigated and detected vulnerable plugins or brute-forced the WordPress administrator password .
Black Hat SEO Malware WordPress
Black Hat SEO Campaign Hypothesis
According to Sucuri, the goal of the campaign is to generate enough indexed pages to increase the authority of the sites and, as a result, rank better in search engines .
In other words, this malicious practice is likely to improve performance metrics in Google's index with the aim of increasing rankings in the results .