Miutsstore.xyz is among the hundreds, possibly thousands, of domain names used to spam Google Analytics with fake referral traffic. If you have noticed suspicious referral traffic from the domain name your Google Analytics account is being randomly targeted by spammers with one goal in mind. To promote services provided on a website. If you visit the URL in a web browser you will be forwarded to a webpage on a third-party website that promotes SEO services. And, who’s the best target for SEO services? Website owners and those with access to a Google Analytics account.
So, don’t be fooled by the shenanigans of this spammer and block referrer spam before it permanently changes your Google Analytics data.
According to the domain name’s whois information (https://www.whois.com/whois/miutsstore.xyz), the domain name was created on 2021-10-04 and this is around the same time as hundreds of other domain names that are used for nefarious purposes. In addition, the owner of this particular domain name has chosen to keep their information private which isn’t unusual for a common website to do but is suspicious for a business or domain name primarily used to promote a business such as an SEO company to do.
Additionally, the domain name’s A record (https://viewdns.info/reverseip/?host=miutsstore.xyz&t=1) shows that it currently shares the same IP address with currently hundreds of similar domain names purchased around the same date and time; all have the XYZ domain extension. To add more fuel to the fire we visited about 10 domain names at random from the records and they all forwarded us to https://semalt.com/?ref=plant. There are likely thousands of domain names being used to solely promote Semalt and the services provided by Semalt.
Is miutsstore.xyz referrer spam dangerous?
Referrer spam is not recognized as a privacy threat; However, spam can easily interfere with a website’s genuine Google Analytics data and change it permanently.
Each visitor from the referring source is fake but Google Analytics can’t identify that therefore the fake referral traffic will be able to change various reports. For example, when a visitor is referred from miutsstore.xyz they are counted as a new visitor with an average session duration of 0:00. In addition, their bounce rate will be 0% and their average page sessions will be 0 and if this type of fraudulent analytical information is preserved over a long course of time it will permanently modify the real data.
How to block miutsstore.xyz spam
Here’s how to block miutsstore.xyz referrer spam in Google Analytics by creating a filter:
- Open your Google Analytics account and go to Admin > Filters.
- Click the + ADD FILTER button.
- Create a Filter Name such as “miutsstore.xyz” or “Referrer Spam.”
- Select the Custom Filter Type.
- In Filter Field, find and select Campaign Source.
- In the Filter Pattern text box, add miutsstore.xyz and click the blue Save button on the bottom of the web page.
To add multiple domain names to the same filter you make a Filter Pattern similar to: “miutsstore.xyz | apkara.com | example\.com” (include the “|” between each URL)
