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Google Using Cloaking in SERP?

Mambo [PersonRank 10]

Tuesday, January 9, 2007
17 years ago2,569 views

Now this is an interesting and controversial finding if ever I saw one.

If you do a search for [create a search engine] in Google, then look slightly further down the first results page, you'll see this result...

http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/7047/unxt2.png

Yet, when you click on it, the title changes. It's also not a redirect because the URL stays the same.

   This is surely a method of cloaking, where the cached markup is different to the actual markup.

There MUST be an explanation for this... otherwise, forget blog "tips"... this is hardcore evil.

Tony Ruscoe [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Here's your answer:
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2006-11-16-n32.html

Mambo [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Ah, I see.

Thanks for getting my heart beating again!

Mambo [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

Although not Google, surely this is a use of cloaking though...

Check out the titles of the top two results...

Search for [pencil artist]:
http://www.google.com/search?q=pencil+artist

Search for [jd hillberry]:
http://www.google.com/search?q=jd+hillberry

Tony Ruscoe [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

What are you getting? I don't see anything strange. (But if the titles in the SERPs don't match the page titles, they could just be coming from ODP/DMOZ instead.)

Philipp Lenssen [PersonRank 10]

17 years ago #

I wonder if it would make sense for Google to display titles or snippets that don't originate at the site with some special layout. E.g. when I change a title in the forum I use [square brackets] to indicate editing. It's potentially damaging to a company to be associated with whatever someone happened to use as link text.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site%3Awww.google.com+sex&btnG=Google+Search

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