Cloaking

Definition and Purpose of Cloaking - Cloaking is a search engine optimization (SEO) technique. - It presents different content to search engine spiders and users' browsers. - Content is delivered based on IP addresses or User-Agent HTTP headers. - Cloaking can deceive search engines for black hat SEO purposes. - It can also be used to inform search engines about non-textual content. Cloaking as a Spamming Technique - Cloaking is often used as a spamdexing technique. - It attempts to manipulate search engines for higher rankings. - Cloaking can trick search engine users into visiting misleading sites. - Pornographic content can be cloaked within non-pornographic search results. - Cloaking is a form of the doorway page technique. Differences Between Search Engine Cloaking and DMOZ Cloaking - Search engine cloaking is intended to deceive search engine spiders. - DMOZ cloaking aims to fool human editors. - Cloaking decisions can be based on HTTP referrer, user agent, or IP. - Search engine spiders behave differently from natural user behavior. - Some cloakers give the fake page to everyone except major search engine referrals. Cloaking versus IP Delivery - IP delivery is a variation of cloaking with different content served based on IP. - With cloaking, search engines and people never see each other's pages. - IP delivery can be used to determine the requester's location for targeted content. - IP delivery is used by Google for AdWords and AdSense advertising programs. - IP delivery is a crude method for language determination compared to HTTP headers. Related Concepts and Technologies - See also: Spamdexing, Doorway page, Keyword stuffing, Link farms, URL redirection. - Technology: Content negotiation, Geo targeting. - References: Cloaking | Google Search Central, Google Developers, Eberwein, Helgo (2012). - Further reading: Baoning Wu and Brian D. Davison's study on cloaking and redirection. - Cloaking is categorized as black hat search engine optimization.