Blogger Blogs And Commenting Permissions

Not all Blogger blog owners know that the ability to comment is a privilege which they control.

Like the ability to publish and read posts, it is also a responsibility which they need to control, carefully.

Any blog owner who wishes to publish a blog, and not be subject to frequent deletion of the blog, as a suspected malware or spam host, needs to understand the responsibilities, and the risks.

There are levels of ability to post comments to a blog, which you select.

Consider possible risks, if you allow comments.

You use the dashboard "Who can comment?" wizard, on the Settings - "Posts and comments" page. Please, protect yourself, if you allow comments.

"Comments" are now a section of the "Settings › Posts, comments and sharing" dashboard page.

• Anyone - includes Anonymous Users.
• Everybody with a Google, or an OpenID, account.
• Everybody with a Google account.
• Blog members only.
• Comments disabled.

Choose this setting with care. If you allow comments by "Anyone", prepare to deal with the spam.

Proper choice of comment authentication discourages spam - and encourages frequent and prompt moderation.

Note these controls are only available for Blogger Comments.

Google+ Comments are open to everybody - and only available in public blogs. There is no setting to restrict commenting to Circle members.

With Blogger Comments, the blog owner controls commenting, moderates, and removes spam. With Google+ Comments, anybody can comment, moderation is by the community, and the person publishing the comment owns and control visibility of the comment.

"Anonymous" includes the "Name / URL" option.

Note that anonymous users can post either anonymously, or using "Name / URL" tags, at their discretion, with "Anyone" selected. "Name / URL" does not provide authentication. "Anyone" means anyone, period.

You may also select CAPTCHA verification for everybody - except members.

Besides "Who can comment?", you may also control comment publishing using CAPTCHA (aka "word verification") screening, and using comment moderation. These settings, like "Who can comment?", are part of the Settings - "Posts and comments" wizard.

Note the these settings are not relevant, if Google+ Commenting is used on the blog.

Choose all settings, as a group, carefully.

Every blog owner, hoping for any visibility in the Blogosphere, needs to choose these settings carefully - or risk being buried by spam.

• Who can comment?
• Comment Moderation.
• Comment Notification Email.
• Show word verification

Comment Moderation, and Comment Notification Email, together, provide 2 settings which can bury your email Inbox, depending upon activity of commenting on your blog. Choose these settings wisely.

If you allow spam comments without control, you may later find yourself asking for help, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken

Help me! My blog was deleted by Blogger!

Protect your blog, and your blog's future, by allowing comments, responsibly.

Be Aware When You Install Third Party Code

We've been seeing a few problem reports, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, from blog owners who are not aware of the risks from installing third party code, on their blog.

Some blog owners are not even aware that the code being installed is not supplied by Blogger - and is not subject to the same coding standards as code supplied by Blogger.

Third party accessories and code - from simple JavaScript that installs in the blog template, to attractive XML gadgets installed using the "Add a Gadget" wizard - has always been a challenge, to Blogger blogs.

Knowing when you are installing code provided by someone other than Blogger / Google, and taking appropriate precautions, is your responsibility. What you install can affect your reader activity - and even your reader's computers.

Blogger provides a large library of XML coded accessories, installed using the Layout "Add a Gadget" wizard.

Sadly, the Blogger "Add a Gadget" library is subject to abuse by hackers.
As we have learned in the past, however, the "Add a Gadget" accessory library is also used for distribution of non Blogger supplied gadgets. Gadgets supplied by Blogger are available using "Add a Gadget", and are labeled "By Blogger".

Google does have other accessory libraries - the late "iGoogle" library is one well known one. That aside, most Blogger blogs - and all non Google websites, which are used for distribution of Blogger accessories and gadgets - are non Blogger products.

Consider, carefully, any third party code.
Be aware of what you are about to install, on your blog.

• A gadget provided using "Add a Gadget", and labeled "By Blogger" is a Blogger provided gadget.
• A gadget provided using "Add a Gadget", but not labeled "By Blogger", is not a Blogger provided gadget.
• A gadget provided using a Blogger blog, which is not published by Blogger, is not a Blogger provided gadget.
• A gadget provided using a non Google website is not a Blogger provided gadget.

These are examples of Blogger supplied gadgets. Anything different is not a Blogger supplied gadget.

If you install non Blogger code in the template, and later see

Your blog has been deleted because of MALICIOUS JAVASCRIPT

this is a risk which you take.

Consider the risks involved, before installing third party code.
Do not install non Blogger code on your blog, without knowing the risks.

If You Cannot Prove Ownership Of Your Blogger Account, Your Next Step May Involve Court Action

We've explored the issues of Blogger account and blog recovery policy, repeatedly.

We've mentioned the business concerns, the personal support issues, the strategic hacking possibilities, and even the personal implications of prevention.

With all of the warnings, we continue to see evidence of blog owners who just don't understand the message, posting in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I started a blog under an alias, to be able to post anonymously, and can't remember the login details or the e-mail recovery. How can I regain access to my blog?

Last year, Blogger Support offered the "final" word about account recovery assistance, in the forum.

Due to the sensitive nature of these issues, we won't be able to troubleshoot your issue in this public forum.

Even giving that advice, some blog owners still insist that Google is not cooperating, in refusing to restore access to Blogger accounts and blogs, to people who cannot prove their right to ownership.

The policy on ownership recovery, provided by Blogger, is quite simple. Anybody requiring recovery has to prove their right to a given Blogger account or blog, using the tools provided.

Because Google doesn't ask for much personal information when you sign up for an account, we don't have many ways to verify that you own an account.

Blogger / Google provide two automated recovery tools - and that is the limit of their involvement. Every Blogger blog owner, who actively publishes a blog, and who wants to keep their blog under their control, needs to appreciate this limit - this is how Blogger and Google prevents devious hijacking of our blogs.

For those blog owners who truly need - and deserve - control of their lost blogs, there is one final recourse. Any owner, who cannot use the Blogger / Google automated tools, are entitled to take their concerns outside Google, and have their identity certified by the courts. Start by hiring a lawyer, take the matter to a judge, and get a properly issued court order. Then, serve the court order, properly, to Google.

Let's let the courts assume responsibility of deciding who is a worthy blog owner - and who is potentially a blog thief or hacker.

Country Code Aliases Cannot Be Bypassed

Occasionally we see the innocent query in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, about the recently introduced Blogger feature - country code aliasing.

Is there any way I can opt out from this constantly changing of the .com termination, into .be, .bg, or .ro, depending on where I travel?

Not many Blogger blog owners realise the benefits of country code aliasing, which is, like auto pagination, a feature which is not optional. There are publicly available workarounds, which may bypass the effects of country code aliasing - and which may cause more trouble than simple URL confusion.

Many spammers would love to setup gateway blogs, and automatically redirect their unwitting victims.

Spammers would redirect traffic to dangerous blogs and websites.

The redirections would lead to other blogs (or non Blogger websites) which contain their actual hacking, porn, or spam payload. Blogger / Google, like some browsers and security programs, actively prevents automatic redirection of Blogger blog traffic.

Blogger malware classification is not understood by everybody.

Not all blog owners understand the effect of Blogger malware classification. Similar to spam classification, malware classification persistently scans through Blogger blogs, looking for signs of malware.

Anti-alias redirection code is very simple, and subtle.

Here's an example - a very simple code snippet, recently discovered in the header of the template, in a blog which has been repeatedly locked for "Malicious JavaScript" / "Spam".

var·blog·=·document.location.hostname;
var·slug·=·document.location.pathname;
var·ctld·=·blog.substr(blog.lastIndexOf("."));
if·(ctld·!=·".com")·{
var·ncr·=·"http://"·+·blog.substr(0,·blog.indexOf("."));
ncr·+=·".blogspot.com/ncr"·+·slug;
window.location.replace(ncr);
}

or maybe, a more compact snippet

if ((window.location.href.toString().indexOf('.com/'))=='-1') {
window.location.href =window.location.href.toString().replace('.blogspot.in/','.blogspot.com/ncr/').replace('.blogspot.com.au/','.blogspot.com/ncr/');
}

or maybe

//<![CDATA[(LF)
var·curl·=·window.location.href;if·(curl.indexOf('m=1')·!=·-1)·{curl·=·curl.replace('m=1',·'m=0');window.location.href·=·curl;}(LF)//]]>

To prevent malware detection from blocking this post, I'm omitting the essential opening and closing tags, which would normally encase the above code snippets.

<script·type='text/javascript'> ... </script>

You can try anti alias redirection code, if you like.

If your blog contains similar redirection code, to bypass country code aliasing, you may get a notice, one day, that your blog has been deleted for "Malicious Javascript". In order to get the blog restored, so your readers may view it, you may have to remove the Malicious JavaScript - then wait until the blog can be reviewed, to ensure that it is safe for public visibility.

When your blog is classified as a malware host, you will suffer.

While you wait for review, you will have to endure the loss of search engine and reader reputation - while every would be reader sees the interstitial notice, mentioning why your blog is deleted or locked.

Work on the problem, don't use (and encourage) dodgy workarounds.

You will accomplish more, and cause yourself (and your readers) less pain, by learning to live with country code aliasing - and concentrating on convincing the various search engines and other Internet services to accept Canonical URLs, so country code aliasing will work, seamlessly, with the Internet service which interests you. Alternately, use better designed gadgets and Internet services.

Blogger Magic - Republishing A Custom Domain

Sometimes, when you have a Blogger blog, published to a non BlogSpot URL, you may need to repeat the publishing process.

Maybe, you want to change the BlogSpot or domain URL, or change the blog - or maybe the previous publishing did not complete, properly. If the blog is currently published to a non BlogSpot URL, you can't just publish it, again. You have to start by publishing the blog back to a BlogSpot URL, before you can again publish the blog to a non BlogSpot URL.

Given the right planning, and understanding of the tasks involved, you can do all of this in 5 minutes - less time than it will probably take you to read these instructions.

The republishing process is not complicated.

1. Publish the blog back to BlogSpot.
2. If necessary, make any necessary changes in BlogSpot.
3. Publish the blog to a domain URL.
4. If necessary, enable the domain root redirect setting.

You'll use the Blogger dashboard Publishing wizard, at Settings - Basic, for all publishing. You can see a quick overview of the process, in pictures.

To publish the blog back to BlogSpot:

• Look at the Publishing display.
• If the blog is published to a custom domain, click on the "X".
• If the "X" is not visible, you'll need to know where it should be - and you can click where it should be visible.
• If the blog is currently published to a BlogSpot URL, you may skip this step.
• If the final objective was to return the blog to BlogSpot, you are now done.

See the "X", to the right of "Edit"?

While the blog is (temporarily) published to BlogSpot, make any necessary changes. Maybe, change the BlogSpot URL, or the Blogger blog.

To publish this blog (or another Blogger blog that you own) to a domain URL:

• Return to the Publishing wizard, for the blog in question, and (if necessary) click on "Setup a 3rd party URL for your blog".
• Enter the published URL.
• If you use the most common DNS addressing, aka "asymmetrical DNS addresses", be sure to only publish to the "www" alias.
• Hit "Save".
• Be prepared to provide domain ownership verification - but, if and only if demanded.

Use the available and working redirect setting, to enable the domain root redirect, if necessary.

When you publish to a domain URL, you may have to add domain ownership verification. In this case, you'll need access to the Zone Editor wizard, provided by the registrar. If you originally used "Buy a domain" to purchase the domain, you'll need access to Google Apps, to access the registrar login instructions.

Other than the domain ownership verification, the republishing process is just a matter of 1 - 2 - 3 (maybe - 4). Having done this, be aware of the possible search engine relationship issues.

Custom Domain Publishing, And Spam Classification

We see the naive question sometimes, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I?, about avoiding spam classification by publishing to a non BlogSpot URL.

Can I keep my blog from being deleted, by publishing to a non BlogSpot URL?

This is a complex question, because custom domain publishing provides several possibilities. But will the possibilities provide an opportunity for avoiding spam classification?

Custom domain publishing, in its simplest form, offers only one immediate benefit.

• The ability to publish to a non BlogSpot URL.

Even when the Blogger blog is published to a non BlogSpot URL, the blog is still subject to spam classification. The Blogger spam classification process, which looks for spammy content, will look for spammy content in any blog, regardless of published URL.

If your blogging activity is centered around several different subjects, as mine are, you may do well to make several different blogs.

• Blogger blogs.
• Cooking.
• Microsoft Windows networking.
• Miscellaneous jokes and musings.
• Reminiscences of days long gone.

Having created a cluster of Blogger blogs, you can aggregate a cluster more easily by publishing each to a different host, in a domain. This is merely one technique, used in a strategy to combine multiple blogs and websites.

Given the ability to separate blogs of different content, you may be able to avoid one known reason for spam classification.

Large blogs with multiple, unfocused / unrelated subjects.

If you host malware or spam in your Blogger blogs, however, you won't necessarily avoid classification. Since a properly published Blogger custom domain blog starts with a BlogSpot URL - and since the BlogSpot URL remains active, even with the blog published to the domain URL, the blog will still be subject to the spam classification process.

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Blogger Magic - Redirecting A URL In Your Blog

In 2012, Blogger gave us a suite of useful utilities to control how the search engines see our blogs.

This feature suite includes the ability to redirect one URL in our blog to another URL in our blog. The "Custom Redirects" feature is easy to use - but like many Blogger features, not immediately so.

Neither its possibilities, nor its limitations, are obvious to everybody.

A Custom Redirect starts with the dashboard wizard, at Settings - Search preferences.


Click "New redirect", to start, if you have redirects already.


Add From and To values, as noted.


Remember to select "Permanent".

1. Go to Settings - Search preferences - Custom Redirects, and click on Edit.
2. If you have existing redirects, click on "New redirect".
3. Enter the correct "From" and "To" values.
4. Select "Permanent".
5. Click on "Save".
6. Click on "Save changes".

You can redirect any URL in the blog - to any other URL in that same blog.

The possibilities are almost endless, when you reference any valid URL in a given blog.

Thanks to the syntax of the "From" and "To" values in the wizard, Custom Redirects will only redirect within the blog itself, and is thus useless to spammers and others who would like to misuse it. Also, the custom redirects, which do not include the published URL, will work after the blog URL is changed - either BlogSpot to BlogSpot, or custom domain publishing.

The URL of this post:

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2013/01/blogger-magic-redirecting-url-in-your.html

The base URL, stripped:

/2013/01/blogger-magic-redirecting-url-in-your.html

Take any two URLs in your blog, strip the base URL, and add a custom redirect.

Just take any two specific URLs (no masking, or wild cards) within your blog, strip the base URL from each, and enter the results as the "From" and "To" values. Always start "From" and "To" with a "/" (no leading spaces, or non visible control characters!), signifying the root of the URL, follow the above procedure, and you're done.

Click here, for examples of what you can do. Then, use your imagination.

Just remember though to use specific URLs, no masking or "wild card" characters. Also - the actual URL - and what your readers see in the address window - will not change. The magic goes only so far.

Removing The "/p/" From the URL

Ever since Blogger (finally) gave us the option to add static pages to our blogs, blog owners started asking

How do I make my pages URLs cleaner? The "/p/" in the URL is so messy looking.

Our typical response would be simple.

Sorry, you're stuck with the URL, as is, for a static page.

And, that was that.

Later, Blogger gave us the ability to redirect URLs within the blog - and that changed.

This is the URL of the topics index in this blog ("labels", to use the Blogger native term).

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/p/topics.html

Here are two alternate URLs, which also reference the topic index.

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/topicindex

and

http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/topic-index

Click on each link, and note where you go.

To make the alternate URLs work, all that I did was use "Custom Redirects", and add two entries.

From: /topicindex
To: /p/topics.html

and

From: /topic-index
To: /p/topics.html

Of course, the address displayed will be the address published - not the address entered into the browser. You can't change the address displayed - you can only simplify what has to be entered. And, to maintain proper spam mitigation policy, you can only redirect within the base URL of the blog.

Other than that, the possibilities are almost endless.

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Blogger Cannot Provide Advance Warning Of Deletion

One of the more intriguing tales, in the never ending saga of malware and spam interdiction, would have to be the confusion about the proper procedure for deleting or locking blogs, when suspected of hosting malware or spam. We periodically see, as part of a "Please unlock my blog!" request in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, the naive suggestion.

It would be better if Blogger Support had immediately alerted me of this problem, before deleting my blog!

The irony here is that, from a purely "customer service" viewpoint, I have to concur with the principle here.

It would be better, if Blogger Support could do this. Like many "it would be better" observations, this is probably never going to happen.

What would happen, if Blogger were to provide advance notification of any malware / spam classification? Many spammers would certainly appreciate this option - to remove the dodgy content, before the blog is deleted or locked. The typical spammer would have several options.

1. Remove the dodgy content, immediately.
2. Copy the entire blog to a second blog in the spam blog farm, and wait until receiving advance notification for that blog. Lather, rinse, repeat.
3. Possibly, do nothing. Later, claim indignantly

   I never got the notification!

   and hope that the kind souls at Blogger Support would give him another chance, since he had not been properly warned.

Option #1, used wisely, could even be used to "map" out the current spam mitigation strategy, and let spammers publish hundreds of spam blogs, staying below the radar. Essentially, we would see self whitelisting of spammy blogs. What spammer would not go for that, in a second?

Besides the spammers benefiting hugely from advance notification, not all genuine blog owners would benefit. Not every blog owner uses a properly registered Blogger account, or will read email from Blogger Support.

So, we have two downsides to the option of advance notice.

• Spammers would love it.
• Not every non spammer would appreciate it.

I, for one, don't see an upside - or certainly not any upside with benefit to counter the downsides.

In Utopia, there would be no spammers, and no need for any of this. Unfortunately, the Internet will never be part of Utopia.

Third Party Gadgets And Recent Malware Detected Blogs

Earlier this week, we noted an increased level of activity in reports about blogs locked as suspected spam hosts, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken. Upon review of the increased volume of spam referrals, with the majority of the cases found to be spurious, Blogger Support provided advice, about a new reason for deleted blogs.

Yesterday, our malware detection system began receiving reports of malicious content on some blogs. While the blog content on many of these blog may be malware-free, 3rd party widgets on these blogs may contain malware.

When a blog is locked for hosting malicious third party gadgets, the blog will be present in the dashboard "Deleted blogs" list - and should be unlocked, on the spot, using the "Restore" option in the list.

The Known Issues advice continues, and describes a planned action.

We’re currently in the process of contacting all blog owners with instructions.

Until Blogger Engineering comes up with an automated contact procedure, owners of blogs which are deleted by Blogger may do well to check their dashboard "Deleted blogs" list, before asking for spam review in the forums.

Owners who find their blog listed, in "Deleted blogs" will be able to immediately restore the blog in question. Having restored the blog, it will be accessible in the "Locked blogs" list - where only the administrators can access it - and remove any possibly malicious third party gadgets, which may have been recently installed. So far, we've seen problems reported with

• Email address collection.
• Third party advertising.
• Traffic redirection
.

All of these are known to trigger malware classification, and cause locked blogs. While the blog is in "Locked blogs", it will remain offline, and inaccessible by readers and search engines.

Once all malicious / unsafe accessories and tweaks have been removed, the owner can submit the blog for unlock review, using the "Request Unlock Review" button in "Locked Blogs". Given a successful review, the blog will be returned to the main "My blogs" list, and restored to service.

Once malicious accessories and tweaks have been removed from the blog in question, it's a good idea to not reinstall them. Repeated detection will lead to Blogger account termination, similar to the penalty for repeated DMCA violations.

There are several reasons why all owners of such blogs may not see their blog listed, in a dashboard list. Owners of these blogs will still be obligated to report their problem in the forums - and to patiently wait while Blogger Support can restore their blogs.

The latter scenario will provide one more example while poorly planned anonymous blog ownership is not a good idea.

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Recovery From Locked Blogger / Google Accounts

Not all blog owners understand the reasons behind the locked Blogger / Google accounts.

Even less understand why recovery of locked accounts, and of the blogs owned by the locked accounts, is not immediate. We see the occasional report, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I had to change the password on my account - and now my blogs are deleted! Why should I wait another "24 to 48 hours" to get my blogs back?

This blog owner does not understand the possible reasons for the locked account - and the work that goes on after the account is unlocked.

Brute force hacking of our Blogger / Google accounts, by hackers / spammers, who have use of the various botnets in the Internet, is a constant activity. Opposing activity, by the Security teams in Blogger / Google, to not let hackers and spammers take control of our accounts and blogs, is just as constant.

Some of the Security activity requires our patience - and blog owners, having to recover their deleted blogs, are not always patient.

The Security processes, in Blogger / Google hacking prevention, have to work from a worst case scenario, when detecting hacking activity.

Immediate detection of hacking is not always a possibility.

Account hacking cannot always be detected instantly. When hacking is detected, the hacking prevention process has to consider the possibility that the accounts under attack have already been compromised.

When Blogger / Google Security detects possible brute force hacking against an account, they lock the account - and delete the blogs owned by the account.

Alternatively, they quarantine the computers used in the hacking activity. This is where we see the notice of "suspicious account activity" - and possibly the dreaded "403 Forbidden".

Post detection security analysis looks at owner mistakes, and for hacking artifacts.

When we discover a locked account, and request its restore, the security process looks for signs of security weaknesses allowed by the account owners - or possibly added by the (temporarily) successful hacker. In some cases, the owner may be required to change the account password, and receive instruction on using a more secure ("strong") password.

Ongoing efforts by Blogger / Google, to make the account recovery easier for the blog owners to endure, may cause mystery about blogs missing from the dashboard, without obvious recovery options.

After the account is restored, all blogs must be carefully checked.

After the Blogger / Google account is restored, the integrity of the blogs owned by the account must be verified.

• The blog content must be examined for spammy content added.
• The blog Permissions list must be checked, for backdoor accounts added.
• The Mail-to-Blogger settings must be considered as a possible backdoor.

These are simply examples of what must be done, to ensure that our blogs were not compromised, even temporarily, by the hacking just detected. After you get your account back, it's not a bad idea for you to verify this, on your own. If you just got your blog back, after resetting your Blogger account password and / or verifying your phone number, check your template carefully, looking for references to unfamiliar JavaScript code, hosted outside Google address space.

Account / blog verification will take time.

The process of account and blog integrity verification will require an unpredictable time period - and needs to be done with the blogs inaccessible to anybody but the Blogger / Google security processes. The blog being offline may not be immediately observed by the owner - and this may cause more confusion.

Blogger Support is aware that nobody wants to deal with the stress of having a locked or deleted blog - especially after they have gone through the process of verifying their account. They are also well aware of the frustration that is present when someone reports

Somebody is publishing spam on my blog - and I can't access the dashboard to remove the spam!

Locking the owned blogs, after hacking activity is detected, complements the ongoing policy of not disclosing the account names, in helping to keep our blogs under our control.

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http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2013/01/confusion-over-recovery-from-locked.html
Confusion Over Recovery From Locked Blogger / Google Accounts

Everybody Won't Get Proper Notice About Their Blog

One problem that we're seeing in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken involves blog owners, who recently discovered their blogs deleted or locked, by Blogger - and without any notice received.

The account actions may be required with the blog deleted for a suspected TOS Violation, such as hosting malware, porn, or spam - or locked because of "suspicious activity" on the Blogger account.

Why was my blog deleted? I never got proper notice!

Too many people depend upon email notification - and may not receive proper notification, in all cases.

Blogger provides a dashboard based malware / porn / spam classification notification / recovery process, which may not be available for everybody. Similar to malware / porn / spam classification, there will be issues with DMCA violation notification.

This is also a problem when accounts are locked for "suspicious activity", and when blogs are locked for hosting malicious third party gadgets.

There are several reasons why some blog owners won't get notification of their blogs being deleted or locked, by the various Blogger / Google security processes.

Nobody should expect advance warning of any action being taken.

Besides notification limitations, nobody should expect to get advance warning of action being taken - as this would simply encourage the intentional spammers to never request review. Intentional spammers, if permitted, would play 3 Card Monte, endlessly, with their spammy blogs.

Both the notification, and advance warning, limitations contribute to confusion about the various Blogger / Google security recovery options. All email based notifications may not be properly delivered.

The owner of any email account, which may not deliver email properly, is still responsible for reading any important email messages.

Some blogs are owned by accounts which use intentionally bogus email addresses.

Too many Blogger blogs are owned by Blogger accounts which are based on inactive or nonexistent email addresses. Owners of these blogs will never see email notification, when they - intentionally or not - make themselves anonymous.

Some email clients may misfile an incoming email message.

In other cases, some people may get the email notifying them of problems - but their email program may misfile the email, in a folder which they may not check, regularly. In some odd cases, somebody other than the owner may get the email.

Blogs owned by teams will be subject to action against any one member.

In team blog ownerships, any blog owned by the team is subject to action, against the Blogger / Google account, used by any team member. Blogs affected will simply disappear from the dashboards of all team members - with no opportunity provided for appeal or review.

Some blog owners maintain too many Blogger and email accounts.

Finally, too many blog owners maintain multiple Blogger / Google accounts, and are not completely sure which Blogger account may own a given blog. These owners may not even see the dashboard based "Deleted Blogs" button / link, because they will be logged in to the wrong Blogger account.

Each blog owner is responsible for any problems, regardless of cause.

Not all of the above scenarios are entirely the fault of the blog owners - but the blog owners are the ones who will have to deal with the resulting problems. It's possible that this may seem unfair - but it's reality.

Benefits Of The New Dashboard Based Spam Review Request Option

The improved spam review option has been available, on our dashboards, for slightly less than 2 months. For all it's usefulness, it appears that some blog owners see the new option as just another bit of red tape, which prevents them from publishing their blog. We see suggestions in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, periodically.

Can't you just submit my review request now, without making me wait another 2 days? Is my dashboard review request really necessary?

Unfortunately, the better the dashboard based spam review option works, the more this confusion should be expected.

Long ago, we had a "Deleted Blogs" link on the previous Blogger dashboard. That link, and the hidden list, were obscure - and explaining how to find the "Deleted Blogs" list was not a job for the weak or impatient. When a blog owner would post in the forums

Why was my blog deleted? I am not a spammer!!

we would typically reply, immediately, with the notorious Spam Appeal Guidelines - then later, cooperative blog owners would see

Your appeal is forwarded to Blogger Support ...

In order to speed up recovery of the less spammy blogs - and shorten the restore wait time for all deleted blogs, Blogger Engineering added the dashboard based "Restore" button. The new button serves two functions.

1. For blogs deleted by Blogger, that are marginally spammy, the blog owner can request an expedited review.
2. For blogs deleted by the owner, less than 90 days previously, the owner can easily restore his own blogs, as convenient.

The new button serves several groups of people, in various ways.

1. Owners of less spammy blogs benefit by expedited restore. When successful, they see their blogs possibly restored on that same day, without their spending any time in the forums.
2. Owners of marginally spammy blogs benefit by regular review and restore, from a shortened queue - since some blog owners will use the expedited queue.
3. Blogger Support can spend less time with the marginally spammy queue, and produce quicker turnaround - yet spend more time examining the truly spammy blogs.
4. Only the genuine spammers will not benefit from the new review queue.

This produces a Win - Win - Win - Loss (sorry, Spammie) scenario.

The blog owners who get their blogs back in a few hours probably won't post in the forums, and praise the improvement - they will be busy re publishing their newly recovered blogs. We may see more oblivious spammers, because Blogger Support will able to spend more time examining truly spammy blogs - which should encourage Blogger Engineering to tweak the automated spam classifier, into digging deeper into the Blogger Blogosphere. So we should expect to see more posts in the forums, for a while.

Why was my blog deleted? I am not a spammer!!

And, it's possible that not all deleted blogs will be listed by the "Deleted Blogs" wizard.

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We Are At The Mercy Of Every Anti-Malware Protection Program Imaginable

We see reports, from time to time, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, about blogs which people can't read, from their computers.

One of my readers claims that I have a virus on my blog. He provided the following information:

AVG anti-virus detected the following threat on the site:

File Name: www.mydomain.com/favicon.ico

Threatname: Exploit Black Hole Exploit Kit

How do I fix this?

Similar to the many reports that we process here, about spurious spam classification, the above report is frequently determined to be a false positive. An anti-virus alert, even if a false positive, is generally not as simple to resolve as a spurious Blogger spam classification, though.

One of the frustrating problems with false malware alerts is that they come from so many different anti-malware products.

I've contributed my opinion about computers, and the suggestion that no two privately owned computers are identical, many times. One way which many computers vary is the complement of security software, which is chosen by each different computer owner.

At any time, any different anti-malware product may decide that some component of your blog is unsafe.

• Maybe, a single file mentioned in your blog code (as above, "favicon.ico") is suspect.
• Maybe, content hosted by "blogspot.com" is unsafe.
• The code may be an accessory that we added, intentionally.
• The code may be content in another blog - hosted by your blog in a bloglist, a linklist, or maybe in the Reading List on your dashboard.

In either case, you (or your reader) won't be allowed to view the blog - or may be allowed to view the blog, but given a stern warning which very few chose to accept.

Like many problems with layered security, any malware detection can come from

• A native browser filter.
• A filter in a browser add-on.
• A filter installed on the computer.
• A filter in a network appliance.

Listen to your computer. some time. Your anti-virus protection may update, automatically - and may audibly announce the update. On a typical day, I hear the Avast client on my several computers announce an update, several times - and I am not (contrary to some misconceptions) seated in front of my computer on a 24 x 7 basis.

Avast (my personally and professionally recommended choice, to many people) is only one of dozens of various anti-malware products which receives automatic updates, when the host computer is online. Any one of these products may be updated, at any time -and somebody's access to your blog (or my blog) becomes blocked.

If you get a message from one of your would be readers

I can't view your blog!

this could be someone reporting that your blog just went offline, for one reason or another - or it can be someone just discovering that the anti-malware program, on his computer, has decided that BlogSpot hosted content, or Blogger code in general, is unsafe. In either case, there is not a lot that you can do, except wait it out - and concentrate on the readers who can access your blog.

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Blog Readers Can't Remove Blogs From Reading Lists

We're seeing an occasional report, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, about inability to manage the Reading List, using the dashboard "Manage Blogs I'm Following" wizard.

Clicking on the dashboard "gear" icon to the right of "Reading List", one should expect to see a list of Followed blogs, in the familiar menu. In some cases, what is seen will be bad news.

We are unable to load your FriendConnect data at this time. We apologize for the inconvenience. Please try again shortly.

Upon trying again, the same error is frequently seen, repeatedly.

As an alternative to Blogger: Manage Blogs I'm Following (linked from the "gear" icon), try Google Friend Connect: Sites I've joined.

"Sites I've joined" may work, when "Manage Blogs I'm Following" won't.

The latter appears to work, for Blogger accounts that use Google / Google+ profiles - and the former, for Blogger accounts that use Blogger profiles.

Owners of Blogger blogs, who use Google+ profiles, won't use "Manage Blogs I'm Following".

So, use "Google friend connect: Sites I've joined".

Click on "Settings", then "Stop following this site".



"Sites I've joined" may require repeat authentication.

Using the Google Friend Connect wizard, you may have to sign into Google again, after clicking on the "Settings" link for the blog / website in question. Having signed in, you may have to click on "Settings" a second time, to get the "Settings" pop up window.

If the "Settings" popup window does not appear - or does not display or operate properly, you may need to check your cookie and script filters, and check that you are properly logged in to Blogger.

Neither wizard will work, if "you" cannot be identified.

There are legitimate reasons when neither wizard will help. Neither Blogger: Manage Blogs I'm Following nor Google Friend Connect: Sites I've joined will operate successfully, if you cannot be identified.

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Blog Readers Report Inability To Remove Blogs From Their Reading Lists
http://blogging.nitecruzr.net/2013/01/blog-readers-report-inability-to-remove.html
Blog Readers Can't Remove Blogs From Reading Lists

Anonymity, Your BirthDate, And Your New Blogger / Google Account

Not all new Blogger blog owners understand why they are asked for their birthdate, when they setup a Blogger or Google account.

Some folks see this as a violation of their right to privacy, and enter a fake birthdate. Some real serious privacy enthusiasts might enter "01/01/01", just to get through the setup process - maybe intending to correct it, later.

Nobody entering "01/01/01", for one's birthdate, suspects that claiming such a birthdate makes them - in 2013 - appear to be 12 years of age. Unfortunately, 12 years is below the minimum age for owning a Blogger blog.

Since Blogger / Google tries to protect the young people on the Internet from inadvertently exposing themselves - or their families or friends - to unknown dangers, people who may appear to be of insufficient age are subject to having their Blogger / Google accounts, and Blogger blogs, deleted or locked.

If you entered a fake birthdate some time ago, and now find your account or blog locked or deleted, you need to prove your age to Google - and you should do this promptly.

The Google Accounts document Frequently Asked Questions about Google Account and Age Requirements explains how you do this. The process of verifying your age / birthdate is not convenient - and some privacy enthusiasts may claim that it too violates their privacy rights - but it is necessary, to let you correct your birthdate - when you are legitimately of legal age.

Now, you have to hope that you did not, intentionally or mistakenly, also provide a bogus email account as your Blogger / Google account name / recovery email address. The process of identifying yourself as the owner (former, nominally underage) of a given Blogger / Google account is easier to do, when you have access to the email account stated as the account recovery email address.

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Stats Pageview Counts Fluctuate Daily, Not At Midnight

One of the many controversial issues about Stats involves the daily pageview counts, which are reset daily.

Most blog owners accept the daily count reset, in principle - they just don't understand why the counts should be reset during their day, instead of at midnight.

My pageview count goes up during the day - but in the afternoon, it goes to zero, then starts over again. Why is Stats so unreliable?

The pageview count reset would be better understood, were it to happen daily, at midnight, for each blog owner. Unfortunately, there are over 24 different time zones, worldwide - and Blogger blogs are surely owned by some persons, in each of the time zones represented.

There are 24 time zones which roughly follow longitudinal lines - plus specific countries which have their own national clocks. WikiPedia identifies a total of 40 time zones.

Some countries span multiple time zones, adding to the 24 longitudinal zones.

Some countries span and divide into multiple time zones, others span multiple time zones and use one time zone. India, for instance, spans 3 time zones, geographically - but observes one time zone, offset by 30 minutes, as "GMT+5.5".

Most people observe a twice yearly 1 hour clock shift.

Many countries observe a seasonal variation, "Daylight Savings Time", when they shift local clocks ahead or behind, by an hour. DST beginning and ending dates vary by country, irregularly.

Also, countries south of the equator start summer, when countries north of the equator start winter. People south of the equator move their clocks forward, when people north of the equator are moving theirs backwards. If you ever try to communicate with somebody in Australia, from the USA, you'll notice how much relative fluctuation this causes, during a year.

To reset Stats at midnight for everybody, there would be pandemonium.

If the daily Stats pageview count reset were to be scheduled according to the local clock of the blog owner (which would be impossible, for multi owner blogs), there would have to be as many reset process schedules as there are countries / time zones. Additionally, twice a year, most reset schedules would be shifted, according to the local DST offset.

The only practical solution is to reset at the same time, worldwide.

Considering the almost inestimable number of rules required to schedule a local midnight count reset for all Blogger blogs, during the entire year, I suspect that the only practical design involves scheduling the reset, for all blogs, at midnight GMT. This means that no blog owners will see their pageview counts reset at midnight, during the entire year.

Everybody simply has to accept their count being reset sometime during their day - with the reset time varying according to the twice a year local clock shift.

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Some #Blogger blog owners claim that Stats daily totals seem to go up, and down, during the day. They do not understand why Stats counts are reset during their day, instead of at midnight their time.