Bad link backs out of my control

[JAGA]

I have a big concern with my website. Recently I have been combing through the back links that I have been able to find associated with my web domain. Almost half of the links- 52 links- are from kinder-host. They are from what looks like could be valid sources, like babies-r-is.com/kinder-host.com or babies.kinder-host.com/page/6 etc. but they are junk. Some of these links are from articles I've written that are ripped off and placed on these websites along with my links. Some of the sites I can't even find the link but its there somewhere. Another 40 of the links are from attracta.com and although I can tell I have links on there to my website as well, I don't even see the link on the page and it is not related to my website. It's another junk site. So, I have bad link backs and no control over it. My understanding is this is potentially very harmful to my website! What can I do about it?

[WesleySmits]

About the ripped articles. If they have a rel=canonical link in the header it shouldn't be a problem.
If they don't have it you can report it to Google.

Half the links is a pretty big number. It's not harmful to your site if you have a couple of bad links coming in. It's part of a natural link profile. Perhaps you should focus on gaining more good links so that your link profile is better in balance. If they are linking to your from websites like porn, drugs, gambling etcetera i would disavow them with Google Webmaster Tools.

For now i think your should focus on getting more quality links since your link count is apparently not very big. (you said 52 links were half of your total link count).

[JAGA]

Thank you for the response. This is helpful and reassuring.

[whiteboardanimator]

The best approach would be to download the links from your WMT (Web Master Tools).

You can then assess what links could be causing any issues. Google specifically states that in WMT they will only show you some of the backlinks to your website, but they will show you a selection of both good and bad. Therefore any bad links will be visible, you just need to identify then and disavow