I work for a web marketing company who is asking me to use Black Hat SEO methods to promote websites. Would my income be permissible?

I work for a web marketing company who is asking me to use Black Hat SEO methods to promote websites. Would my income be permissible?

All about White Hat, Black Hat, and Grey Hat SEO Techniques: 
Various techniques are used for search engine optimization (SEO) and can be grouped under the terminology of white hat SEO, black hat SEO, and grey hat SEO.

White Hat SEO: 
White hat SEO is ethical SEO. It’s SEO techniques that search engines accept. White hat SEO techniques are beneficial for site visitors as well as for search engines. The goal of white hat SEO is to improve search engine result positions via methods that won’t cause search engines to penalize the site. 
Examples:

• Using relevant keywords (short tail and long tail keywords)Including keywords naturally in page titles, headings, link anchor text, other page content, and alt tags
• Adding fresh content regularlyStudying analytic reports and fine-tuning the content to further optimize it for targeted keywordsUsing correct HTML markup (for example, heading tags) so that search engines can identify headings and other types of content correctlyMaking sure that all the code is valid (or at least won’t stop search engine bots)
• Creating site maps so that every page is linked to and search engine bots can crawl every page Using CSS to separate content from markup and thus increase keyword density by having less markup to craw
• lCreating quality content that other people will want to link to optimizing pages for social media in the hopes of attracting social media link

Black hat SEO: 

Black hat SEO is the use of techniques that are unacceptable to search engines to boost a page’s position in search results. These techniques are intended to trick search engines into giving pages higher positions in search results, and they have no benefit to site visitors. The goal is to improve search engine result positions no matter what it takes to do it.
Examples:

• Overusing keywords in comment tags, alt tags, and meta tagsOverusing keywords in visible text (Keyword stuffing)
• Placing keywords in hidden text (hidden from people, that is) by making their font color the same color as the page background
• Using Doorway or gateway pages that are stuffed with keywords but that only search engines see because people are redirected to the page with the real content
• Using Cloaking techniques for displaying different content to search engines than to people by identifying visitors via IP or via other methods
• Using link farms solely for the purpose of creating more links to target pagesSpamming forums, blogs, and other social media sites with links (search engines might not penalize sites for this, but it’s considered unethical)

Grey Hat SEO: 

Grey Hat SEO is a combination of white hat SEO and black hat SEO.Grey Hat SEO = White Hat SEO (ethical) + Black Hat SEO (non ethical)

In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.

As-salāmu ‘alaykum wa-rahmatullāhi wa-barakātuh.

We have deliberated on the information you have provided. From the reading which we have done on the subject, we understand that Black Hat SEO are essentially advertising methods. They are considered unethical by a large number of internet programmers, and search indexing websites like Google Inc. consider them against their Terms of Condition.

That being said, we were not able to come across any piece of legislation that would incriminate this mode of advertisement such that the perpetrator is legally taken to task for it. Google Inc. in but one website that indexes the websites and then ranks them as appropriate or inappropriate as per its Terms of Conditions. If a website enters in a contract with Google and then violates the terms, then the income of the website will become haram, but if a website does not enters into any contract and yet is monitored and ranked by Google, then the website has not committed any illegal act, hence the income will be permissible.

We have come across a few actual court cases where Google de-listed websites for using BlackHat SEO, reducing the traffic to those website by more than 50%. The websites sued Google for it in the court, but their claims were dismissed. The underlying reason for the court opting for Google’s opinion over the plaintiffs was that Google has the liberty to allow and disallow the websites from advertising on its own. Hence, the BlackHat SEO violated Google’s terms and not that of any law.[1]

However, the issue will remain that BlackHat SEO methods are unethical. They have an element of deception in them. They may also be detrimental to one’s website and business should Google or other such search engines choose to de-list the website or de-rank it. In light of this, it will be undesirable to use these methods, but not illegal. According to Shariah while these marketing ploys may not be outright haram, but are definitely discouraged. The deliberate use of such tactics will make one’s business void of barakah (blessings), and hence should be avoided.

Although we recommend you to not use these methods in your internet marketing business for your client, yet at the same time the income generated from the work in BlackHat SEO will be permissible and halal.

 
And Allah Ta’āla Knows Best

Mawlana Faisal bin Abdul Hameed,
Student Darul Iftaa
Montréal, Canada

Checked and Approved by,
Mufti Ebrahim Desai.

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