Fixed: This Site May be Hacked Google Search
This site may be hacked is a not common issue, which you might have seen while searching something on Google. “This site may be hacked” Search error occurs due to Cloaking or URL injection on your site. In this article we will talk about the fixation of “Site may be hacked” Google search result problem.
Why “this site may be hacked” issue occurs?
There is a lot of reasons which leads to the occurrence of “this site may be hacked” Google Search result issue. I ahve mentioned the important ones below.
{Read:- 5 Best tips to Grow Your SEO Audience 2021 }
Cloaking – It is a SEO technique in which the content presented to the search engine spider is different from that presented to the user’s browser. This is done by delivering content based on the IP addresses or the User-Agent HTTP header of the user requesting the page.
It is like when Google bots visit your web page it finds an awesome article but when human visits they find some other contents. It might be the other website redirection or some adult content.
{Read:- Googlebot SEO Benefits 2021 }
URL Injection – WordPress run on a database-backed platform that executes numerous PHP server-side-scripts, it can be vulnerable to a series of attacks – such as URL injection, or malicious link insertion.
In simple terms, URL injections take place when an individual attempts to manipulate your online database through the commands sent by the URL.
SSL certificate not installed on web site – SSL (Secure Socket Layer) is very much important to protect your site from spammers and hackers. you already have seen padlock and https in the URL’s you generally open.
{Read:- What to do for Fast Google Indexing 2021 }
Now the question is How we can fix “this site may be hacked” search error. let’s have a close look at that.
How to fix “This site may be hacked” search error?
Follow all the steps mentioned below to fix this issue permanently. You can also watch my YouTube tutorial about “this site may be hacked” fixation.
Finding and deleting the injected files
The very first thing you need to do is, you have to find out which of the files are injected on your Website. This can be done using Google Search Console.
- Open Google search console and login to your account
- Go to Security issues tab
In Security Issues tab you can find the sample of links given by google which causing an error. You can easily find some pattern which is creating an error for Google bots to properly read your site.
{Read:- SEO Benefits of Pingback in WordPress }
You can also download all the sample of links in an Excel file just by clicking on “Download all Samples”button.
If you see the image given below, you can find in my case the URL starts with “tq5m” pattern, which is a folder created in my public.html directory. Public.html folder is the root directory for any website. You must have your Cpanel credentials to access that file.
If you are using WordPress hosting and you don’t have Cpanel then you can download “WP File Manager”Plugin to access your root directory.
There might be more than one pattern, So you have to find and delete them from your root directory.
is this done? aah… No, not yet. There might be some blocks of codes which may be injected in your header.php or footer.php files. These are the prime files So, I have mentioned them here. By the way it can be any file inside your directory.
{Read:- HTTP to HTTPS redirection using .htaccess file }
Request a Review for fixing the “this site may be hacked” to Google
This is the last step which you need to perform in order to fix “this site may be hacked” error. Requesting a review means Google bots will check your website again if the hacked error is fixed or not. To perform this action follow the steps-
- Open Google Search Console
- Go to “Security Issues” tab
- Mark “I have fixed these issues”
- Click on “Request a Review”
This will take up to 1 month to fix “this site may be hacked” search error.
