Tips Tuesday – WPForms Sneaky Stuff, Video Monetization Changes, AI Watermarks

Tips this week include:

• WP 7.0.4 security update
• WP 7.1 RC1 available
• New WP browser extension
• Why to delete redirected posts
• WPForms accused of installing a backdoor
• GSC workshop on new Platforms report
• TikTok lowers payout
• YouTube raises Partner Program requirements
• New EU AI Watermark law and how it affects you
• Why are EU laws stricter?
• More social platforms flagging AI-generated content
• My thoughts on the AI watermarks and flags and why they will disappear

WordPress Tips

WP 7.0.4 Security Update

This is getting to be a weekly thing, isn’t it?

But that’s just how fast security issues are being found due to AI.

Be sure that your site has updated to WP 7.0.4.

WP 7.1 RC1 Available

The next major version of WP is set to release later this month.

The first Release Candidate is ready for testing.

FYI, even though they removed the “worrisome” things from this release that might goof our plugins, I’m still going to wait until the final version is released before I start my testing.

New WP Browser Extension

The official WordPress Browser Extension has been released for Google Chrome and Chromium-based browsers, which would include Brave.

The purpose stated:

“This new open source extension lets logged-in site users easily hide the admin bar while keeping its most helpful shortcuts in the browser toolbar, provides quick access to all of your WordPress sites, and adds helpful tools for developers and content creators.”

I won’t be using it, but that doesn’t mean it is not useful. See the article for more info.

Plugin Tips

Delete Redirected Posts or Pages

If you create a redirect, be sure you delete that original page or post that you’re redirecting from.

If you don’t, then your caching plugin will likely cache that original page and it could be served up instead of the one you redirected the URL to.

That’s because your caching plugin caches every page/post it finds. And it runs prior to your redirection plugin. 

And because of the interplay between your caching plugin and Cloudflare’s cache, your redirect may only work randomly.

So, if visitors go to that link, some folks may see the original page and some folks may see the one you redirected to, depending on the cache status of Cloudflare in their region.

You can also check your Google metrics to see if any original pages are still active on your site. I’m betting they would show up as crawled in GSC or have traffic to them in GA4.

WPForms Accused of Installing a Backdoor

Awesome Motive makes a LOT of popular WP plugins. And they’ve been a big part of the WP ecosystem since 2011.

So, I’m going to tread lightly with my opinion about this. But, I will say that they should know better than to do it.

Here are the facts.

The WPForms plugin is made by Awesome Motive.

And before we get into this, it’s worth noting that Sybre Waaijer, who is the one who broke this story, is the publisher of The SEO Framework plugin. That is a direct competitor to Awesome Motive’s All-in-One SEO plugin.

Sybre posted on X that the WPForms plugin is now inserting a backdoor admin-level access on WP sites when the plugin is installed.

The nice folks at Search Engine Journal tested to see if this was true, and what they found was disturbing.

When WPForms is installed, it offers a wizard to help you build your first form. That builder is AI powered.

Okay, that’s not so bad, but here’s the part we don’t like.

Sybre tweeted:

The wizard “takes over your browser and opens their app on WPForms’ servers. It hands that app a one-hour login token for your site. Their app can then act on your behalf on your site.”

He went on to say:

“Their app can install and activate plugins. It can also turn on a switch that starts sending your form submissions to WPForms’ servers. The plugin never asks first and never warns you.”

They can also install any of their other 13 plugins during this process.

Roger Montti, the SEJ staff member who wrote the article linked above, installed WPForms to see what happened.

It did indeed take him off his site to the WPForms site.

And it did indeed install 3 other plugins.

Here’s what I know for a fact.

Even before the above happened with installing WPForms, for years now some Awesome Motive plugins would install other plugins that were not requested, nor were site owners given the opportunity to opt out of it.

Case in point, WP Mail SMTP. When my clients installed it to move their email off their hosting to an SMTP service (which is best for security), it also installed WPForms.

And simply deleting that unwanted WPForms plugin does not fully get rid of it. The plugin leaves orphaned files, folders, and database tables behind (which of course, I removed during audit checks).

So, Awesome Motive installing other plugins is not new. But taking folks off their sites unawares, and dropping a token to make changes is new.

Keep in mind that this is only happening on new installs. 

So, if you already have any of these plugins, and are my client, I’ve already cleaned up the orphans and any potential backdoors. That means you can keep the plugins you have.

FYI, my clients and I prefer Fluent Forms and Fluent SMTP for plugins that meet our needs for these functions. But we do use WPCode Lite for inserting Header/Footer scripts, and it is made by Awesome Motive.

SEO Tips

GSC Workshop on New Platforms Report

I made a tutorial last week in the DIY SEO course that showed how to set up the new YouTube and social media reports that Google Search Console rolled out to everyone.

This week, we’ll be meeting live to see what’s in those reports.

And this is especially important now that Google is showing links in Search to more platforms like Instagram, Facebook Pages, Pinterest, and others.

Video Monetization Tips

TikTok Lowers Payout

There are 2 ways to see this news.

Creators who depended on this income are now jumping ship.

But that also means that this is a great opportunity for you to get more eyeballs there.

If you could use TikTok to drive more traffic to your money makers rather than relying on money from the TikTok platform, this could be a great time for you to get in there and grab those eyeballs that others are abandoning.

YouTube Raises Partner Program Requirements

Starting February 2, 2027, creators who are joining the YPP (YouTube Partner Program) for the first time will still need 1,000 subscribers to qualify. 

But the big change is that they must now achieve 8,000 hours of public watch time from the past 365 days or 20M Shorts views from the past 90 days. 

That’s double the watch time hours and views!!!!!!!

Folks who are already in the YPP are grandfathered against this change.

I can guarantee you that ad money is not drying up on YouTube. 

So, what’s driving this?

You guessed it, AI Slop.

There’s been a huge increase in new creators on the platform and unfortunately for some of us, the AI generated stuff is very entertaining.

I’m guessing Google’s plan is to raise the bar to incentivise AI Slop creators. I think that’s going to go the other way and make it harder for folks who put real time and effort into making quality videos have to work harder than it’s worth, at least if they plan to make money directly from the videos.

All I know is that folks will have to do a LOT more marketing on other platforms to drive traffic to their new YouTube channel now. 

But then, that’s the same thing you have to do for your website traffic too.

AI Tips

New EU AI Watermark Law – It Affects You

Europe is cracking down on AI copy/paste, or using AI to entirely generate things.

The EU AI Act’s Article 50 started being enforced August 1st.

It requires all AI generated content to carry a hidden watermark that can’t be removed.

Anthropic, wanting to be seen as the perpetual good guy, was the first to sign on with compliance.

That means any content that you copy/paste from Claude will have this watermark – even if you gave it text that you 100% wrote, and just used AI to check for typos or such. If you copy/paste it back out of the AI, it will have this watermark.

FYI, almost every kind of spell or grammar checker now has AI. Things that create voice-to-text transcripts are AI now too. 

Most all of the big AI companies have signed on to comply.

That includes the biggest AI music generator, Suno.

I did not see if AI images/videos from these companies are included, but I bet they will be. And what if you just used it to clean up the background of a photo you took?

This law could be a little overboard for mixed creation use cases.

Why Are EU Laws Stricter?

The European Union has moved swiftly to deal with concerns about AI over the past 2 years.

In fact, they move much more swiftly with regard to all kinds of things that negatively impact their population – like food safety/ingredients and technology (most recently, replaceable phone batteries).

So, how is it that the EU can be so quick with legislation and regulation on these things?

I think it’s because they don’t have nearly as much industry to disrupt.

They are mostly consumers of what others are making.

Yes, several EU countries have their own AIs. But they are not nearly as powerful as the ones made by US companies. 

So, maybe they don’t have as much money to lose.

That’s my best guess. Happy to hear your thoughts on it.

More Social Platforms Flagging AI-Generated Content

I think they are doing this to cut down on AI-Slop.

But I think it’s going to backfire.

If the content is entertaining and/or helps folks, then those viewers stay on that platform longer.

And it certainly doesn’t make any sense for platforms that have their own AI generators to do this – like Meta.

Honestly, I don’t think AI-generated is the problem. I think it’s the sheer volume that can be created and published that is worrisome to these platforms. It can easily drown out human-made content.

My Thoughts On All This

Here’s some wild speculation on my part as I pondered these new watermarks.

Scenario 1

There is a big difference between AI-assisted and AI-generated, but there is only one type of watermark. So, if the content is 100% written by you, but AI was used as a spellchecker, it gets the same watermark as content that was 100% written by AI and then edited by you.

Scenario 2

Google wants you to use Docs to write your content, and use Gemini to help you do it. So when that content gets published on your site, are they going to flag their own tool that they wanted you to use, and maybe not rank your content as high in Google Search?

Scenaria 3

I often quote articles here in Tips Tuesday. So, if the original writer used AI to spell check, and these watermarks are supposed to follow along through the copy/paste process no matter the source, will my content get flagged for having an AI watermark?

Scenario 4

On social media, what if you share a post published by someone else that has an image where AI was used to change the background or such? Will your shared post get flagged?

Scenario 5

Pro SEOs have used bogus listicles, blog posts, and review sites to get their clients ranked. And now they can produce that slimy content at scale to flood AI crawlers with brand mentions so that they rank there too. (AI crawlers only count the number of mentions and have zero consideration for the quality of the source.) Will a watermark matter to the AI crawler?

In the End

What happens when most everything we see or read online is flagged as AI? I think that day is coming. And I think that flag will be useless at that point and will be removed.

Some day it will be odd for AI to not have touched, in even some small way, every sort of thing we consume online.