You Can Fake Your Google +1 Counts With Redirects

Feb 26, 2014 - 8:47 am 1 by
Filed Under Misc Google

Google + ButtonEnrico Altavilla discovered a bug with how Google+ shows +1s for a page, which has already been patched by Google. It is pretty amazing and reminds me of how webmasters faked their PageRank back in 2005.

In short, by using a simple redirect on the page, a page was able to pretend it was another page and use the +1s from the page they are redirecting to as the their own +1s.

So when a site had a weird JavaScript redirect to YouTube, it thought the site was indeed YouTube and that page inherited the +1s YouTube had.

Google +1s hijack

Again, this no longer works but I figured I share the story so if it happens again, a different way, we have something to look back at.

To learn more about this, see ideativi.it.

Forum discussion at Google+.

Update: +demetriosiragusa found this issue and supposedly the bug still works.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Google Search Volatility

More Details

Search Video Recaps

 
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Google AdSense

Google Working On Fixing Local Service Ads Bug

Sep 1, 2026 - 3:17 pm
Search Forum Recap

Daily Search Forum Recap: September 1, 2026

Sep 1, 2026 - 10:00 am
Google Search Engine Optimization

Global: Google Search Console AI Performance Report & AI Control

Sep 1, 2026 - 7:51 am
Google Ads

Google Ads AI-Generated From The Store Rating Reviews Label

Sep 1, 2026 - 7:41 am
Google Ads

Google Ads Performance Max Help Docs Updated

Sep 1, 2026 - 7:31 am
Google

Google: Verifying Your Request To Continue To Search Results

Sep 1, 2026 - 7:21 am
 
Previous Story: Google Tests Detailed Local Reviews In Knowledge Graph