What is Cloaking? Should you use Cloaking techniques in SEO?

Currently, some SEOer brothers are using many black hat SEO techniques to surpass Google and get a high position on the Google search engine. One of these techniques is called Cloaking.

The following article of TipsMake.com will explain to you what Cloaking is and whether to use it in SEO or not.

What is Cloaking?

Cloaking or Cloaking technique is a method used by SEOer to provide two different types of content to users and to search engine crawlers (bots). Cloaking's purpose is to improve a website's ranking for certain keywords on search engines.

In short, with the intervention of Cloaking technique, what you see on a website will be different from what the Google bot sees.

In addition, Cloaking is also used by hackers to display content tailored to specific goals.

Types of Cloaking Techniques

Agent user masking

A user agent is a program that acts on behalf of the user. For example, a web browser behaves similarly to a user agent fetching web page information in the operating system.

When you enter a query, the browser automatically sends a code to the server to distinguish/identify the user agent. If the user agent is confirmed to be a crawler (bot), the masked content will be served.

IP-based cloaking

Every user who visits the website will get an IP address based on their location and internet service. Based on the IP address, the site administrator will filter out what is the user's IP address and what is the bot's IP address to serve pages with different content.

JavaScript-based obfuscation

The webmaster will provide users with JavaScript-enabled browsers one version of the content and users with JavaScript disabled another version of the site's content.

HTTP_REFERER . cloaking technique

In this method the HTTP_REFERER header of the access requester will be checked and based on that, the masked or unlocked web version will be served.

HTTP Accept Language header obfuscation technique

This technique checks the user's HTTP Acceptable Language header and based on the matches, a specific version of the web page is displayed. In a word, if the HTTP Acceptance Language header is from a search engine then a masked version of the web page will be served.

Should you use Cloaking techniques in SEO?

In the SEO industry, technique Cloaking is one of the black hat SEO methods and it is banned by Google. If intentionally used and detected, your website will be banned or blacklisted by Google, not allowed to display ads.

Google has a lot of algorithms and complicated, rigorous testing methods, so you can't beat them for long. Therefore, do not use Cloaking techniques and black hat SEO methods, but look for safer, more sustainable solutions for long-term results.

Lesley Montoya

Update 27 June 2023