What is guardlink.org and how to block it in Google Analytics

If you are getting unwanted guardlink.org referral traffic you’re not alone. Guardlink.org is a URL that actively engages in referrer spam indexing tactics aimed at your website’s analytical data. Guardlink.org referrer spam is used to promote the website and boost their rank in Google search results by creating backlinks off your website’s access logs. Guardlink.org referrer spam can cause a lot of problems for website owners, webmasters, and basically anyone who finds their website’s analytical data valuable. Guardlink referrer spam can destroy your appropriate Google Analytics data, including the Audience, Acquisition, and Behavior analytical data measured by the service. For example, referrer spam can ruin your bounce rate because the spam URL only lands on a single webpage and leaves your website from the same single webpage. Referrer spam can also show up in your referral traffic from a variety of geographical sources around the world.

guardlink

This guide will help you block guardlink.org referral traffic in Google Analytics and block guardlink.org referrer spam with your .htaccess file in order to stop referral traffic from guardlink.org.

What is guardlink.org?

Guardlink.org is a website associated with semalt.com that engages in referrer spam indexing tactics aimed at your website’s analytical data. Guardlink.org referrer spam is designed to produce repeated site requests onto your website at any given time and from any location around the world using traffic bots, computers infected with malicious software, and other blackhat tactics. The benefits that referral spammers have by engaging in referrer spamming is that it will allow them advertise the website they want people to visit and it will improve the spammers search engine ranking by creating backlinks to their website off your website’s access log. The downside is that referrals from guardlink.org can mess up your appropriate Google Analytics data and other website metrics provided by third-party services. In some cases it can also use up your website’s bandwidth by creating repeated site requests.

Referrer spam is a very questionable tactic used to promote online content. Spammers target the referral traffic of your website for several reasons:

  • Referrer spammers want to promote a webpage and want you to visit the webpage or search for it online through Google search engine results pages.
  • Referrer spammers want to boost their rank on Google search engine results pages by creating backlinks. They do this by logging requests into your website’s access log, which is then crawled by Google bot and seen as a backlink to the spam site.

Guardlink.org referrer spam is not entirely dangerous to your website. It will most likely not cause any trouble with how your website is accessed by your visitors or ranked by Google. However, in some cases guardlink.org spam may use up your website’s bandwidth and CPU by creating multiple site requests to your website. In other cases, the spam URL is served to your analytical data by traffic bots which create ghost hits and never actually land on your website.

1. How to block guardlink.org referral traffic in Google Analytics

To block guardlink.org referrer spam in Google Analytics follow the instructions below. Blocking guardlink.org referrer spam in Google Analytics by creating an exclude filter will only mask the spam URL. To block the referrer spam URL at the sources see the instructions below to block guardlink.org referrer spam using your website’s .htaccess file.

1. Open your Google Analytics account and go to the Admin tab and click All Filters.

how to block referrer spam

2. Click the New Filter button to create a new filter.

block referrer spam

3. Add guardlink.org as the Filter Name.

4. Select the Custom Filter Type.

block referrer spam google analytics

5. In Filter Field, find and select Campaign Source in the list. In the Filter Pattern text box, add guardlink.org and click the Save button on the bottom of the webpage.

2. How to block guardlink.org referral traffic with your .htaccess file

To block guardlink.org referrer spam at the source using your .htacess file add the code below to your .htaccess file.

## SITE REFERRER BANNING
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} guardlink.org [NC,OR]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} guardlink.org
RewriteRule .* - [F]

Sean Doyle

Sean is a distinguished tech author and entrepreneur with over 20 years of extensive experience in cybersecurity, privacy, malware, Google Analytics, online marketing, and various other tech domains. His expertise and contributions to the industry have been recognized in numerous esteemed publications. Sean is widely acclaimed for his sharp intellect and innovative insights, solidifying his reputation as a leading figure in the tech community. His work not only advances the field but also helps businesses and individuals navigate the complexities of the digital world.

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