Written on August 28th, 2007 at 10:08 pm by Darren Rowse
AdSense Add ‘Allowed Sites’ Feature
AdSense have added a new ‘Allowed Sites’ feature to the back end of their system for publishers to use.
You can find it by logging into your AdSense account - clicking the ‘AdSense Setup’ link and then the ‘Allowed Sites’ link.
Publishers get the choice to allow ads on any page or only selected ones. If they choose to only allow it on certain sites AdSense say the following:
“If you put your ad code on a page not on this list, ads will still show, but impressions and clicks will not be recorded.”
What’s the feature for? There’s no official announcement or word on why it’s been introduced at this point.
From what I can tell it’s a protective measure for publishers concerned that their AdSense ad code might be used on sites that they don’t authorize that could get their account into trouble. I wasn’t sure that this was a big issue - but I guess we’ll hear more about their reason to add the feature at some point soon.
33 Responses to “AdSense Add ‘Allowed Sites’ Feature”
JohanBru
August 28th, 2007 10:54 pm
This is indeed to prevent people from using your adsense code on another site and abuse it (and possibly get you banned) that way. Have seen this requested somewhere a while ago.
If they add this it it about time they add something to prevent click fraud too. “Ignore clicks from IP if more than X clicks are received within Y hours from the same IP” or something like that.
Lindsay
August 28th, 2007 10:56 pm
INTERESTING…
Looks like yet another case of the due diligence boffins attempting to come to grips with the new economy.
To me, it smells a little of the “please spread our message where ever you like” but don’t blame (or sue us) when it turns ugly…
Matt Jones
August 28th, 2007 11:16 pm
Strange I never head of people useing someone elses AdSense code on their site… but well done Google for planning ahead I guess.
Rhys
August 28th, 2007 11:29 pm
It is an odd one.
A Blog about Nothing
August 28th, 2007 11:47 pm
Don’t even have a way to tell if it is actually working because they still display the ads even if they don’t credit you with the clicks.
Neil Matthews
August 29th, 2007 12:17 am
This may be a cover for click fraud scam.
Grab someones code which is displaying a competitors ads, place it another site i.e. a made up blogger account and start clicking.
I’m not sure how effective this will be, the existing invalid click controls would probably cover this type of attack.
Thomas Crown
August 29th, 2007 12:35 am
It’s good for sites offering to share revenue with users I think
Arjun Muralidharan
August 29th, 2007 1:11 am
That’s good. I for one had built in my adsense code in several places and got a click here and there, but that’s against the TOS afaik. So it gives me some more control over my own mistakes.
Jon Symons
August 29th, 2007 1:15 am
If you do restrict your AdSense using this method, be aware that you may lose impressions and clicks from Google’s cache and translation services…so use with caution.
BlogEx
August 29th, 2007 1:18 am
Darren,
You are exactly right, it’s to help people protect their AdSense accounts. Right now anyone can go rip off your adsense code, put it on a page or site with content that would break Google’s TOS and then either wait for it to get you in trouble, report it, or even click the snot out of it. There are all sorts of ways someone could put your AdSense account in hot water and this is just removing one of them.
A Blog about Nothing
August 29th, 2007 1:53 am
Blogex,
Wouldn’t Google be able to figure out if all of a sudden it is getting a ton of clicks from a totally different ip in a totally different location than where you are located?
Better Blogging with Michael Martine
August 29th, 2007 1:56 am
I guess this is an unofficial statement on the current inability of Google to battle click fraud algorithmically.
Adnan
August 29th, 2007 2:08 am
A peace of mind feature for publishers by Google AdSense
Tihomir
August 29th, 2007 3:02 am
This option is very useful and I knew they will implement such a function soon. Many people are worried about pub-id hijacking issue that could lead to Google account suspension.
mamat
August 29th, 2007 5:13 am
Thats really goods. actually for some people have to hang out only for internet marketing to live lolz…
Hip Hop
August 29th, 2007 5:18 am
I don’t think this would be very useful to me, I don’t really mind what sites are showing on my site.
Tay - Make Money Blogging
August 29th, 2007 5:41 am
I’ve wondered about them having something like this before. It’s quite easy to show another person’s ads, and then when you abuse them that person could get banned. Way to go, Google! :)
Million Dollar Homeboy
August 29th, 2007 5:59 am
I like the addition of this option, but I don’t think it goes far enough. I wish they would add an IP filter or something else to decrease the chance of click fraud. Also, if a site that doesn’t meet Google’s TOS is using my pub number, how would I know???
erch
August 29th, 2007 6:10 am
this option for safety to the publisher for clickfraud
and this option very useful for almost publisher
Sydney
August 29th, 2007 6:16 am
I’m sure there’s just something here that I’m missing but what would be in it for someone else to get your number banned? I mean, it seems like a lot of work for nothing. What’s in it for them? They can’t make money off of your number, and if they get you extra impressions and you don’t get banned, they are actually making YOU money. So why on earth would some nameless faceless person out on the net want to do this to you, someone they don’t even know, running some small site somewhere? Can someone please clue me in?
Dave
August 29th, 2007 6:24 am
I don’t see it as a bad thing, but think they need to expand it and add a third option where you can select sites you dont want to work. Maybe its my own paranoia, but I would rather like to say who I dont want to have access to as well plus I could see an advantage or two to having specific pages within ones own site where you would like to keep yourself from making a mistake.
Jeremy Steele
August 29th, 2007 7:16 am
I guess it’s a good thing they are planning ahead.
Then again if someone like Darren “accidentally” used my adsense code on let’s say… ProBlogger… well I wouldn’t mind that at all ;)
Roffi Grandiosa
August 29th, 2007 6:41 pm
cant they hide the code?.. just my 0.02$
buzzware
August 29th, 2007 7:13 pm
why in my account there’s no “Allowing Site”??
Josh
August 29th, 2007 9:54 pm
Wow cant believe it took them this long to get it out. I stumbled upon a forum a couple of weeks ago and two guys were talking on how to sabotage another using their Adsense account. WTG Google.
JOSH
Chris
August 30th, 2007 11:34 am
This feature must not be available to all publishers yet because I can’t find it in my control panel either.
Karthik
August 30th, 2007 10:20 pm
I don’t really see the point behind this, if at all someone wanted to get you banned, they don’t have to rip your pub code and place it somewhere else and THEN click the hell out of it, they can do so right on your site! Maybe Google is trying to find a way to clamp down on that too and we may see a development on that soon enough.
simon
September 1st, 2007 7:40 am
This Allowed Sites Feature is created by Google China Team. The reason to add the feature is because some AdSense publishers are concerned about potentially malicious behavior from others on the web such as stealing their ad code and placing it on an inappropriate site.
her
September 8th, 2007 1:03 am
I found that there are some website displaying google ads that is not in usual format.
How that could happen..does it allowed
Jan London
September 11th, 2007 9:40 pm
Bad, bad, bad.
No-one has spotted one thing here! Let’s start from beginning… I activated “allowed sites” about a week ago. Suddenly, my earnings went down by about 30%-40%. Why? Really why?
Was anyone using my adsense code on his pages? Not sure. OK, so I decided to wait. Yesterday I opened the “allowed sites” console and found many IPs and domains showing my ads without permission. OK, but what sites am I talking about?
Here is the result: Various Google’s IPs, images.google.com.something (au, es, fr, and many others) + aol search (which works as frame - top frame is aol and bottom frame is your site) + some translator site.
What is my point? The “Allowed sites” feature is not perfect because it automatically lowers your earnings. If anyone clicks on your ad through images.google.com.au and you don’t allow this URL to be valid for your ads, you will lose money.
So I allowed all sites to show and operate with my ads and my night earnings were 50% higher than average night earnings during the last week when I was using “allowed sites”.
I already sent a message to Google so am hoping that they will solve it somehow.
“Allowed sites” is great feature, but it should be designed in another way… Blocking instead of allowing. If Google shown us URLs where clicks come from, we would be able to block “bad” domains. It would be more simple.
Benny
September 27th, 2007 5:12 pm
Well, I think its a good feature. You just have to go throu the list of disallowed sites and allow them if they are ok(such as google cached pages). Potentially you miss a few clicks at first, but soon you will have the list of most search engines cache servers.
Shamim
November 25th, 2007 5:26 am
Adsense Revenue Sharing is a great way to earn extra income by taking part in the community on other web sites. Another new forum which share 3 unite add with member. http://share.ideatodays.com
Andos
June 16th, 2008 12:10 am
@Jan London: That’s a nice info. Thank you
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