Ahrefs Study: Google Does Not Punish AI Content

• Whether or not Google penalizes AI-generated content is a hot topic among SEO professionals. A recent study by Ahrefs offers some data-driven insights.
• Ahrefs took the top 20 ranked URLs for 100,000 random keywords, then extracted 600,000 pages of content from this list. Of this list:
  • 4.6% of pages were categorized as “pure AI”
  • 13.5% were categorized as “pure human”
  • 81.9% were categorized as a mix of two
• Based on their AI detector, over 86% of top-ranking pages contain some amount of AI-generated content.
• When they calculated the correlation between AI content percentage and search ranking position, it was effectively zero.
• “Google neither punishes nor rewards AI content… Al usage doesn’t predict ranking position.”
• Ahrefs concludes from their data that Google apparently cares more about whether searches find the content helpful than they care about how the content was created.

Subscriptions Stay Sticky After Court Strikes Down Click to Cancel Rule

• A federal appeals court has struck down the FTC’s “click to cancel” rule, which would have required companies to make it as easy to cancel subscriptions as it is to sign up.
• The rule, which was set to go into effect this week, was part of the FTC’s effort to crack down on dark patterns that make it difficult for users to exit recurring charges.
• A three-judge panel from the U.S. Fifth Circuit ruled that the FTC overstepped its authority by issuing the rule without proper congressional authorization, effectively blocking its enforcement.
• The FTC has not said whether it will appeal the decision, but previously framed the rule as essential to fighting deceptive business practices.

Backdoored Gravity Forms Version Briefly Distributed Through Official Site

• A malware-infected version of Gravity Forms was briefly available for manual download via user accounts on July 9 and 10.
• Only versions 2.9.11.1 and 2.9.12 downloaded directly from gravityforms.com (or via Composer) during that window were affected.
• Auto-updates and any versions obtained through the Gravity Forms plugin interface were not impacted.
• Patchstack identified obfuscated code injected into the plugin’s main file, enabling persistent access and the potential to install further payloads.
• Gravity Forms continues to investigate the breach and is coordinating with malware reporting services and hosting providers.

Worth a Look

• WordPress Credits is a new program from the WordPress Foundation that offers internships for university contributors.
• Photopea is an online photo editor that opens 60 different graphics formats (even animations and those old Fireworks PNGs).
• Flashback to 1983 – check out this browser based emulator for Apple’s Lisa OS (and here’s the story behind it).