It has been confirmed via a WebmasterWorld thread that many search ranking checking tools have been working over the past day or so.

Just about a month ago we reported about the issues people were having with WebPosition Gold and other rank checking tools. We first thought Google was going after these rank checking tools but then we learned that the issues were due to Google testing out new HTML structures and layouts in the search results pages.

The WebmasterWorld thread reports that not only is WebPosition Gold now working, but other rank checking tools also. So maybe the Google experiment is over or maybe it is on a vacation? Or perhaps, the tools built in a fix for the scraping issues.

I still know Google hates these tools but will they go as far to block them?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.