Stay clear of hyperlinks within the footer if you want to avoid penalties
 

The most recent algorithm tweaks currently have apparently targeted too many links inside the footer. I personally consider this could have been mistaken for some type of farmer strategy, having said that I don’t really see the logic behind it. Yes, you can have 100 sites with outbound links from the footer pointing to one big site, but I don’t think you are going to be happy with your ranking.