The UGC link attribute (rel=”ugc”) is an HTML tag used to identify links found within user-generated content, such as blog comments, forum posts, or community-submitted content, signaling that the site owner doesn’t necessarily vouch for or control these links.
This attribute helps protect websites that host user-generated content from being held fully accountable for the quality or intent of links that visitors themselves might add, without needing to remove all user linking capability entirely.
Properly implementing the UGC attribute on comment sections and similar user-contributed content areas is a straightforward technical safeguard against a common source of spammy, low-quality outbound links.
UGC link handling is reviewed as part of our Technical SEO service.