Ask HN: Did your traffic drop during Google's "Malware Incident"?
I have a modest, relatively low traffic little blog and my site’s traffic dropped by about 36% from what it was last week during that time period (which is big when you consider Saturday Morning isn’t a high traffic time to begin with). I’m not sure I ever realized Google’s referrals meant that much (referral logs aren’t necessarily accurate due to the differing ways you can click on a link)
It’s interesting because Google didn’t prevent people from going to the sites it blocked. It simply warned them they MIGHT be dangerous. Not only that, the message users got doesn’t really lay out what criteria they use to determine a site’s danger meaning not only was it just a suggestion but it was a suggestion given with no basis to judge it by. So following requires quite a bit of trust in Google.
If other people saw the same thing I did this might be the most striking sign of Google’s power yet.