Google indexed thousands of ezoic files on my site + server errors

Ezra

My website is hosted on Ezoic. Recently, I noticed that Google has indexed thousands of Ezoic files linked to my site, which has negatively affected my Google rankings. My site went from a few hundred indexed pages to over 300k indexed pages.

Most of the indexed files seem to be in Japanese, while my site is in English.

A quick google search of site:mywesite.com shows thousands of Japanese files that i did not publish. The links to the files re-direct to other pages on my site. Google has punished and de-ranked my site for this reason.

Also, my Google search console shows there are server errors with my site. Due to these errors, I do not have access to my WordPress dashboard.

When I log into my WordPress dashboard, I can not perform any actions. When I try to use the dashboard, the message I get is: "Forbidden, You don't have permission to access this resource."

Ezoic_Auto_Mod

The majority of site errors can typically be resolved using one of the solutions below. It is advised that you troubleshoot using this advice whilst you wait for a member of the Ezoic team to get back to you.

1. Clear out your browser cache

There is a chance that you are cached into an older, erroring version of your site. Please clear out your cache or try viewing the URL as domain.com/?nocache. If you see the site is live, you can be assured that it is a caching issue and the site is not actually down

2. Origin Error

This includes the following errors: 500, Origin, 520, 403 forbidden, 401, 503. If you are seeing an origin error on the site, we advise you to follow the advice found in this thread: https://community.ezoic.com/d/10310-what-to-do-if-you-see-an-origin-error

If your host isn’t able to whitelist Ezoic’s IPs, please inform the Ezoic team of this and await potential next steps.

3. DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN

This means that you need to update the records in your Ezoic DNS settings. Please check to see if the DNS records in Ezoic match up with the DNS records at your host. If they do not, you will need to edit the records in the Ezoic DNS settings. The following guide will help you with this: https://community.ezoic.com/d/11329-what-to-do-if-you-see-a-compatibility-error

4. SSL errors, such as ‘Your connection is not private’ and ‘NET::ERR_CERT_DATE_INVALID

We advise you to disable any SSL plugins and SSL at your host. Once you’ve disabled any third party SSL technologies make sure to clear the cache and check if the error persists.

5. Other errors

If you are still seeing another kind of error error, send over a screenshot of the specific error message you’re seeing on your site alongside a screenshot of the DNS records from your host to allow the Ezoic team to look into this quicker for you. If you have managed to resolve the error, let us know in the thread!

Ezra

The problem has still not been resolved.

Firstly, my WordPress dashboard does not load fully.

When i try to perform any actions on my wordpress dashboard, i get an error message.

Here are screenshots to illustrate the problems i am facing.

The first screenshot shows how my wordpress dashboard looks when loaded (it doesn't fully load).

The second screenshot shows the error message i get when i try to perform any action on my wordpress dashboard.

The third screenshot shows an example of the thousands of ezoic files that have been indexed by google. They show up when i search site:mywebsite.com. Google sees these pages as spam, and has punished my site for it.

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Emily

Ezra if you can send a screenshot showing some of the URLs being indexed in search console we can ask the Tech team for more insights on that as it's not something I've seen happen before.

With regards to the forbidden error you're getting on login pages:

Have you made any changes / updates to any of your plugins recently, or installed any new plugins, (particularly security plugins?)
Your screenshots of the error did not come through - please could you reattach them?
Last time we saw this issue it was because the publisher had deleted the index.php file - can you have a look into that. If that doesn't apply then please address points 1 and 2 and we'll ask the Tech team to take a look.

Ezra

Emily I did not edit any files. In fact, i did not log into my site for a few weeks, and only noticed these problems when i tried to log back in.

Below are screenshots showing some of the URLs indexed by google.

If you search "site:amphibianplanet.com" on Google, you will see there are thousands of pages like this, indexed in the last few weeks. The pages are in Japanese, but my site is is English.

The pages seem to be ads that may have appeared on my site, and redirect to online stores when clicked on.
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Ethan

Ezra Can you send us some screenshots of the Console errors you're seeing as Emily already requested?

I am seeing the Japanese URLs when I look on Google search too and I then get sent to a Japanese ecommerce site. It does look a bit odd, but can you clarify further how you believe this contributed to poorer rankings? We're not doubting you but just need some further information

I also see you have Japanese visits, so yes it does seem these ecommerce sites were shown as ads to Japanese visitors.

Last, are you still struggling to log into WordPress? My sugestion would be to turn off your plugins one by one. In most cases sites on Ezoic hosting run into errors when the site is using a plugin that isn’t compatible with Ezoic Hosting. To troubleshoot this you need to disable your plugins. In order to disable the plugins whilst on Ezoic hosting you can access the files via SFTP. Next, disable the plugin folder entirely to see if that resolves the issue, simply add ‘-old’ or ‘-deactivated’ to the end of the plugin folder name. If it does, you can then locate the specific plugin(s) causing the error and leave those disabled, again adding the phrases ‘-old’ or ‘-deactivated’ to the end of the specific plugin name. Here’s how to access SFTP whilst using Ezoic hosting: https://wordpress.ezoic.com/how-to-access-sftp-when-site-is-hosted-on-ezoic/#:~:text=In%20order%20to%20access%20SFTP,upper%20left%20of%20your%20dashboard. If that doesn‘t fix it, let us know and we‘ll reach out to the hosting team.

Ezra

Ethan The main errors are appearing in my WordPress dashboard, not in the search console. I can log into my WordPress dashboard, but i can not perform any actions because the server gives a "Forbidden, You don't have permission to access this resource", error.

A screenshot of the error message is below.

I have tried everything, but nothing works. The problem seems to be with the ezoic servers, and can only be resolved by the ezoic hosting team.

With regards to the indexed ezoic pages, i believe google sees them as spam links, and has downgraded the overall authority of my site because of that.

I noticed that many of my pages that ranked really well for years, suddenly disappeared from google or where pushed down the rankings right when those Japanese pages started appearing on my site.

My site went from a few thousand indexed pages on search console, to over 300 thousand indexed pages in less than a month.

Also, when those pages started showing up on my site, a bunch of errors started appearing in search console, and i get a new error almost everyday. The ad pages have broken my site.

If its possible, I'd like the Japanese ad pages to be de-indexed and completely removed from my site.

I tried to restore a backup of my site to get rid of the Japanese pages, but i can not do it due to the server errors on my WordPress dashboard.

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Mohammad2306

Ezoic doesn't randomly create Japanese content and put it on your website. Evidently, that's not what happened here.

When you search for this issue, you will find what has most likely happened here is that someone else got access to your site and made changes.

You will want to review these guides and update your site:
https://web.dev/articles/fixing-the-japanese-keyword-hack
https://wordpress.org/support/topic/403-error-forbidden-after-japanese-seo-hack/

Ezra

Mohammad2306 Okay, I have solved the problem by deleting my WordPress core files, then running a clean, brand new WordPress installation. Thanks for the help.

londonblue

Yes this is a hack, I don't know how anyone could attribute this to Ezoic!