How PBNs work
- Expired domains that still have backlinks from their past life are bought, often at auction.
- Each domain gets a simple site with thin or spun content, hosted separately to hide the connection.
- The sites link to the “money site” that the owner wants to rank.
Why PBNs are risky
- They break Google’s spam policies: links made to manipulate rankings are a link scheme, and reusing expired domains this way can also count as expired domain abuse.
- Networks get detected: shared hosting, themes, owners, link patterns and thin content give them away, and systems such as Google’s SpamBrain are built to spot them.
- The value disappears: Google may simply ignore the links, so the money spent brings nothing, or the site that benefits gets a manual action.
What to do instead
Earn links with content and relationships: original research, useful tools, partnerships, PR and expert contributions. If you have inherited PBN links from a previous agency, get them removed, or disavow them if they have led to a manual action.
How to recognise a PBN link
- The linking site has thin or generic posts on unrelated topics.
- It has no real audience, authors or contact details.
- Many sites share hosting, themes and link patterns.
- Posts contain exact-match keyword links to one commercial site.
- The site’s history looks like an expired domain with a new, unrelated topic.
What to do if you have PBN links
- Check your link profile in Search Console and a backlink tool.
- Ask the site owners to remove the links.
- If you have a manual action, remove what you can and use the disavow tool for the rest, then submit a reconsideration request.
- Move to links you can earn. See backlinks.
PBN FAQs
Are PBNs illegal?
Not illegal, but they break Google’s spam policies on link schemes, and the risk falls on the site that uses them.
Do PBNs still work?
Google’s systems are built to detect and ignore such links, and sites that rely on them can be demoted. We do not recommend them. See also black hat SEO and backlink indexers.