If you are a black hat search engine spammer, odds are you’ve heard of Article Bot. Article Bot is one of the most recognized brand names in Black Hat Search Engine Optimization. During the past few days there have been some discussions about what spying the Article Bot Software might do on its users.
Now, it would be easy for me to just look the other way on this story and push Article Bot by puting up an affiliate link. But I’m not going to do that unless we we can get to the bottom of all this.
Throughout the day, I watched as http://articlebotscandal.blogspot.com/ went from:
Tons of Information that included: Cached version of Blogger Article Bot Scandal Blog.
1 .Article Bot connects to a domain owned by Andy Skinner to do a license check
2. Article Bot creates and uploads a copy of the first spun file to his domain
3. Article Bot deletes the uploaded spin file from the user’s local machine
4. Article Bot creates and uploads a copy of the user’s sitemap for the project
5. Article Bot deletes the uploaded sitemap file from the user’s local machineAs you can see, Article Bot has been receiving a copy your templates and keywords from every project you’ve created. This has been going on at least from build 1114, and most likely the full life of the software. Article Bot is getting a copy of everything you do.
The blog was trimmed to this version by 6:00 pm on 8/19/2005
I am removing everything that tells you how to test it out. I’m removing the instructions on how to safeguard yourself. I’m removing the proof of everything.
to
it’s current state. (almost nothing)
We have archived the information in the original posts on SEO Black Hat as a service to you, our readers. If you own Article Bot, please do your own due dilligence on this one and tell us if the information in these archives is true or not:
SEO Black Hat’s Archive of how the Article Bot Scandal Blog existed at 1:00 pm 8/19/2005
SEO Black Hat’s Archive of how the Article Bot Scandal Blog existed at 6:00 pm 8/19/2005
Your thoughts and comments on this one will be greatly appreciated.
9 Responses to “Article Bot Scandal: Is Article Bot Spying on its USERS too?”
They must have really scared the piss out of him if he took it down so quickly. His evidence looks completley convincing. How much more do you need? There are screen shots of the one of the chief developer’s directory housing the jobs. Buyer beware. And, the more technical you are, the better. I agree, only the paranoid will survive.
OK I may be biased but it was down right dirty, wrong and almost definately illegal. Moving on from that though is the application wasn’t that great.
It was a PITA to use and limited in functionality. Yeh I know I have a better product and I know I want users for it and I know that makes me far from impartial but come on. Doesn’t this escapade just about sum things up?
www.WidgetBaiting.com - That’s where the real thing is and V2 at www.widgetbaiting.com/cgi-bin2/index.pl that does feeds too as well as other stuff - Well that just puts it in a whole different ball park!
It actually pretty funny in a sad way. The question is: why did it take so long for anybody to notice? Is it that people are lulled into a false sense of security because they are not dealing with a large company??
Love the blog - love the site icon btw. Keep ‘em coming 
Article Bot Spying on its users?
Ok - as a software developer and marketer I have often been tempted by
the really handy information that is available from users usage
patterns.? Some developers cross that line - and I would think -
profit by it quite nicely.? Its commonly called s…
Here’s the official response…
well, it’s interestig that you can’t post on the board anymore - http://www.activeboard.com/forum.spark?forumID=47354&subForumID=111638&action=viewSubForum
a couple things … i always have that box checked on my nic card config screen … it gives me an eyeball view of transmissions from my pc. you notice things, like macromedia and adove apps checking into base etc …
i installed the firewall but i have no activity with the firewall enabled or not. sop i dunno … this is all .net … so it would be easy to rem out those lines of code if it exists on his end.
but i think the app rocks in any case, if they are collecting data and if i can block it, it’s not going to stop me from using it.
i bet the engines are in a panic about it anyway … it’s pretty good at what it does.
now what we need is automatic article bot … cause spinning a large article takes hours!
Actually, they still do it…I dont know how they do it now. I was working on some articles and keywords which only I know. However, I received an email from Article Bot on suggestions on how to use the software effectively. In that email, they gave me better suggestions for the same keywords I was writing articles on!!!! How they know what I am working on without spying on me??? Well I believe that they are still spting on their uers BUT dont know how this time….
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