SelectQuote Review Comment Spam

    Looking at Google Webmaster Tools, I have noticed something quite strange.  I have gained a massive number of inbound links recently, despite doing nothing special to gain them.  It appears the vast majority of them actually came towards the beginning of this month, and are just being counted by Google now.
    The majority seem to be from comments on blogs.  They are very generic comments with incorrect grammar. The comment also never varies, nor does the link text.  So I suspect automated software is being used.
    The question is, by whom and for what purpose?  I didn't pay for any SEO this month, and this isn't the sort of the link building I would wish to employ.  Where are I have posted a comment myself, I always reference something mentioned in the article.  It just seems polite.

    Also, my own comments have been in much more relevant blogs, such as a life insurance blog where the writer is critical of SelectQuote.  The poster of recent comments isn't going to the trouble of picking relevant blogs, grammar checking his English, or making a specific comment on the article.
    So, I'm curious. Is this a supporter who just doesn't want to invest much time in the cause?  Is it a competitor of SelectQuote, who wants to promote my valid criticism of SelectQuote, but who isn't going to put in much work to build links since it's not for their site?  Is it someone who actually supports SelectQuote, and is hoping that Google will penalize me given the complete lack in variance between these links?  Or is it someone who actually meant to point to SelectQuote's new website called SelectQuote Reviews?
    I'm not seeing much traffic from these links. I don't think many people follow links from obviously spammy comments. I just hope I don't get a penalty from the search engines due to the questionable nature of these links.
    It raises an interesting question. Is it possible to sink someone else's site in the search rankings by employing link spam pointed at them?  I think humans will not be fooled, the difference between my writing and that of the commenter is obvious.  The question is, can you fool the computers at Google and Bing into believing I'm the spammer?
    Obviously, the search engine's algorithms are closely guarded secrets.  So far, I am getting just as many impressions from Google as I was before this round of comment spam. Webmaster Tools just now began counting these links, however.
    Hopefully, Google just won't count them as very good links.  It could create a whole new type of black hat SEO if someone could sink your site in the search results merely by pointing a bunch of questionable links at your domain.