Google: GoogleBot China Crawler A Bug

Mar 10, 2011 - 9:39 am 5 by

GoogleBot ChinaMost all SEOs know that Google's search spider, GoogleBot, crawls from Mountain View, California.

So when a webmaster asked in a Google Webmaster Help thread why GoogleBot is crawling from China as opposed to from California, some Googlers began scratching their heads.

It turned out that there was some sort of bug that Google fixed to stop GoogleBot from appearing to be crawling from China.

JohnMu of Google said:

It looks like that was a temporary quirk and shouldn't be happening anymore :). Thanks for pinging us!

This can be a serious issue for many sites because I know of many sites that outright block Chinese IP addresses from accessing their web sites. And if Google crawls from China and you are blocking China, then you are blocking Google from accessing, crawling, indexing and ranking your site in Google.

It is weird to me that this would happen but it was also weird to Google.

I am not sure how wide spread it was but this is the first complaint I have seen on this topic.

Forum discussion at Google Webmaster Help.

 

Popular Categories

The Pulse of the search community

Search Video Recaps

 
Video Details More Videos Subscribe to Videos

Most Recent Articles

Google Search Engine Optimization

Google Supports Fewer Structured Data, Not More Like Promised

Jun 30, 2025 - 7:51 am
Bing Ads

Microsoft Removed Over One Billion Ads & 475,000 Advertiser Accounts

Jun 30, 2025 - 7:41 am
Google

Google Tests AI Mode In Chrome Search Bar (Desktop & Android)

Jun 30, 2025 - 7:31 am
Google

PSA: Fan Out Queries Are Not In Google Search Console

Jun 30, 2025 - 7:21 am
Google Ads

New Google Ads Broad Match Experiments Testing

Jun 30, 2025 - 7:11 am
Google Ads

Google Ads API Outages and Slowness; Microsoft Ads Warns About Google Imports

Jun 29, 2025 - 8:12 am
Previous Story: Crafting Google Instant Search Suggestions