Google has confirmed that a massive leak of around 2,500 internal documents related to its search engine is authentic, with one expert saying the finding shows that “Google tells us one thing and does another” when it comes to its mysterious algorithms.
The tech giant has been secretive about how its search engine works while wielding enormous influence over the flow of information, traffic and advertising revenue online.
Some of the details appeared to contradict previous public statements by Google employees about what factors are and are not used to calculate rankings.
For example, a Google Search employee said in 2016 that the company does not “have a website authority score”.
The company has it too Explicitly denied the use of Chrome data in search rankings.
Information in the documents, however, suggests that Google takes into account click-through rates, data from its Chrome web browser, the size of the website and a factor called “domain authority” – a measure of the importance or relevance of ‘a website on a particular subject- to guide rankings.
Some experts described the Google document leak as the biggest ever for its search algorithm. AP
“The main takeaway here is that Google tells us one thing and they do another,” iPullRank CEO Michael King, who published the first analysis of the finding, told The Post.
“These documents give us clarity,” King added. “We don’t have the recipe that Google is using for search, but now we have a very clear indication of what the ingredients are.”
Some experts, including the trade publication Search Engine Land, have noted that the documents mention modules that suggest Google implements “whitelists” for certain topics, including searches related to the election (IsElectionAuthority) and the COVID-19 pandemic (IsCovidLocalAuthority ).
King said references are likely Google’s attempt to identify “quality sources” on a given topic.
The documents allegedly contains more than 14,000 classification factors that Google considers when ranking websites, from media outlets like The Post to small business owners and beyond.
The internal data appeared in the online code repository GitHub in March, but did not receive public scrutiny until Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experts Rand Fishkin i Michael Hill obtained and published separately breakdowns
The documents represent “the biggest leak we’ve ever seen come out of Google for search,” according to King.
“This is the biggest and most transparent we’ve ever seen about how Google works,” King said.
Google confirmed that the documents were authentic. AFP via Getty Images
Google tacitly confirmed that the documents are real, although it warned that they lacked significant context and that the public should not use them to learn about how search works.
“We would caution against making inaccurate assumptions about search based on out-of-context, outdated, or incomplete information,” Google spokesman Davis Thompson said in a statement.
“We have shared extensive information about how search works and the types of factors that weigh our systems, while working to protect the integrity of our results from manipulation,” the statement added.
Google also cautioned that the documents are not a complete, relevant or up-to-date view of its search ranking algorithm.
It’s still unclear whether Google actually implemented any of the ranking factors detailed in the documents, or whether it just tested or experimented with them. Some may never have been used.
Google cautioned against drawing conclusions based on the documents. Reuters
Even if they were in use, it’s essentially impossible to gauge how important they are in shaping what users see in search results.
The documents did not disclose how the rating features are weighted.
According to Barry Schwartz, a prominent SEO expert and owner of web consultancy RustyBrick, the leaked documents offer an interesting but incomplete view of the inner workings of the company under investigation.
Schwartz said the documents are best viewed as a sign of “what Google is thinking” when it comes to online search.
“The way Google does it around certain factors like links and content quality and authority and authors, that’s all there,” Schwartz said. “The question is, we don’t know what the weighting is, how important these signals are, are they used at all. That’s the problem with it.”
[ad_2]
Source link
