Negative SEO refers to the unethical practice of sabotaging a competitor’s search engine rankings through malicious tactics such as spammy backlinks, content scraping, and hacking. These black-hat strategies can lead to search engine penalties, loss of organic traffic, and brand reputation damage. Protecting your site from negative SEO involves monitoring backlinks, securing your website, and using Google’s Disavow Tool to remove harmful links. Stay vigilant and proactive to safeguard your rankings from these harmful attacks.