How Penguin changed
- 2012 to 2014: Penguin ran as separate updates. Sites that were hit often had to wait many months for the next update to recover.
- 2016 (Penguin 4.0): Penguin became part of Google’s core algorithm and started working in real time.
- Since then, Google mostly ignores spammy links rather than demoting the whole site.
What it means today
Link spam is still against Google’s spam policies. Google’s SpamBrain system and link spam updates neutralize unnatural links, and serious cases can still get a manual action. The safe approach is to earn links with content and relationships, and to use the disavow tool only if you have a manual action or know of a large number of paid or spammy links pointing to your site.