Link spam- What is that and how to deal with it?

Links spam is defined as a link connecting two web pages that exists solely for the purpose of boosting up search engine rank [1]. The algorithms used by search engines today are based on the assumption that web programmers would only provide high quality links from their websites [2].

As more and more internet users are familiar with the way of the current search engines operate, many websites nowadays are exchanging links with other sites regardless to the fact whether the information provided in the linked pages are related with their own. Some websites even do business by using this strategy (by offering links to somebody’s sites and accepting well payment in return)

So, how can SEO deal with these problems?

One alternative suggested by Langville and Meyer in their book is by adopting a method called ‘bad rank method’ in addition to the current algorithm used by search engines [2]. In this method, search engines are recommended to penalize a website whenever it provides a link to other non-relevant webpage. In other words, search engines may increase the page rank of a site based on the amount of links coming into it and then decrease the page rank based on the amount of bad quality links it made to another sites.

So, how do you think about the recommendations made by these briliant fellows?

Other related pages:

Optimizing your e-business with SEO
How does search engine work?
What makes a good website?
Building a new website? Here are some recommendations for you..
What is E-Business?
How does e-business earn money online?

[1]Wikipedia, Spamdexing, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link_spam#Link_spam, Date retrieved May 28, 2008
[2]Langville, A.N. and Carl D. Meyer (2006). ,Google’s Page Rank and Beyond: The Science of Search Engine Rankings, Princeton University Press, New Jersey