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Home , Google Alerts, Reputation management

The New Demands of Online

Shannon M. Wilkinson, CEO Reputation | Editing and Research by Christopher Hampton

The best tactics for avoiding many of those crises ABSTRACT are proactive. They include online monitoring of the The explosive growth of the has dramatically company and executives’ online presence, as changed the demands of reputation management. well as of sites maintained by family There are few barriers to online, and every members. Company executives in particular should author has at least the potential of reaching broad be made aware of online security practices, including audiences. There are also few laws regulating online protecting their data and using encryption for online information. Content is often posted anonymously, correspondence. Most importantly, the company and operators have legal immunity over should establish a strong online presence, including what is posted on their sites. In many cases there interactive forums where company representatives is no one to prosecute, and no leverage to demand can address grievances. retractions. Effective planning will protect a company against Online reputation management first appeared in many reputational threats. Reactive ORM techniques the mid-1990s, and has grown along with Internet are increasingly focused on the production of quality use. These changes have also forced a much more content. The manipulation of results— proactive stance toward the protection of brand what used to be considered the central activity of integrity. Security professionals now have a broad ORM firms—has lost its utility as search engine mandate for investigating, addressing and resolving algorithms have grown more sophisticated. online threats to the reputation of their company and its executives. THE NEW DEMANDS OF ONLINE This paper gives an overview of the leading online REPUTATION MANAGEMENT reputational threats faced by companies in the United States, as well as an explanation how such The EU’s recent passage of the “Right to Be Forgot- events unfold, the motivations behind them, and ten” law gives European citizens the ability to force how they can be protected against and resolved. and other search engines to remove links to embarrassing or irrelevant information. Threats discussed range from the dissemination of the home addresses and family information The passage of that law increases the contrast of executives to the leaking of internal company between legislation regarding online publishing in documents by inside sources, targeted online Europe and the United States. In the U.S. there are campaigns, and the impersonation of still very few legal boundaries constraining the pub- executives on social media and other platforms, in lication and distribution of online content. Authors addition to more conventional crises. are free to post most any material anonymously. If

The New Demands of Online Reputation Management

NATIONAL CYBERSECURITY INSTITUTE JOURNAL | VOLUME 1, NO.2 1 anyone finds that material to be damaging, they tions behind them, and ways they can be protected have little leverage to demand a retraction and no against and resolved. clear target for prosecution. Discussion about new Before explaining these strategies, it is important to legislation has revolved around freedom of speech clarify what online reputation management is, how it issues, issues that have advocates including such differs from reputation management (which addresses well-funded organizations as the Electronic Frontier corporate culture rather than Internet content) and Foundation. how the aggregation and social sharing of information In the U.S., the main law governing the Internet is on the Internet contributes to ORM issues. Section 230 of The Communications Decency Act, which frees website owners from legal responsibil- THE ONLINE REPUTATION MANAGEMENT ity for what others post on their sites. It states, “No INDUSTRY provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any The online reputation management (ORM) indus- information provided by another information con- try first appeared in the mid-1990s. From that tent provider.” point, it has grown in step with the Internet. ORM is popularly known as a service that repairs repu- Understanding the implications of that law and how tational damage caused by malicious anonymous it impacts the privacy, security and of commentary posted on Internet sites. Some ORM U.S. citizens is recommended for cyber profession- firms claim to improve reviews of businesses online als. Security professionals now have a broad mandate (on sites such as ). Others promise to push for investigating and addressing online threats to unwanted Internet content onto lower pages of the reputation of their company and its executives. search results. But the field is much broader, and the Their employers and colleagues often seek their best firms use a range of techniques to protect and guidance in mitigating the many issues that result build a client’s brand. A range of such companies from the types of defamation, embarrassment and can be viewed by Googling “online reputation man- physical security risks that have become a common agement” and scanning the first five pages of results. occurrence online. Today all major corporations and public companies have cyber departments within Like the Internet as a whole, the online reputation their security and investigations departments. The management business is largely unregulated. As a FBI has a cyber investigations unit, as do the law result, instances of extortion by disreputable ORM enforcement departments of most major cities. providers have been well-documented in the media (Krause, 2014). (For instance, any individual who SHORTCOMINGS OF CURRENT LEGISLATION has been arrested may be approached by an ORM provider that offers to the dissemination of Passed in 1996, Section 230 has not been updated to a mug shot. If the provider isn’t contracted, it may accommodate the new platforms and new types of disseminate that mug shot itself.) (Connelly, 2012) social behavior found online. It does not adequately Some ORM providers offer services. protect individuals from defamation, from the wide- They use a combination of content, technology spread publication of their age and home addresses or and SEO (search engine optimization) to influence from the harm that can result from both. where a company’s marketing materials appear in In the absence of legal protections, there are a search results. The effectiveness of this approach can range of strategies individuals and companies in be impeded by the continually evolving algorithms the U.S. can put in place to safeguard their reputa- Google and other search engines use to determine tions online. This paper gives an overview of the how results are ordered. (Visit Google’s “How Search leading online reputational threats, as well as an Works” for more information, http://www.google. explanation of how such events unfold, the motiva- com/insidesearch/howsearchworks/thestory/)

The New Demands of Online Reputation Management

NATIONAL CYBERSECURITY INSTITUTE JOURNAL | VOLUME 1, NO.2 2 REPUTATION MANAGEMENT • Targeting of family members who have shared (perhaps too much) personal information on social Online reputation management is often confused with media outlets. “reputation management,” which refers to the broader task of maintaining the public integrity of an organiza- • Being the subject of parody that criticize tion or individual’s brand. Reputation management and lampoon CEOs and other public figures. has exploded as an industry during the last ten years As a specialist working in this field, I have encoun- because of the rise of social media and the transparency tered each of these threats. I have seen emails from it engenders, as well as the increased ability of citizens top executives at public companies get extracted from and consumers to comment publicly on behavior, the company’s secure digital archives and published policies and products. In addition to encompassing in online forums; organized Twitter campaigns send- communications and public relations (including crisis ing out multiple Tweets daily with links to defamatory management), reputation management is also a lucra- false content about public figures; satellite photographs tive consulting practice that spans the review of every of the homes of high-profile executives published aspect of a company’s internal structure to ensure its online with maps and directions to their homes and culture and practices adhere to and reflect a company’s for readers to do them harm; and nude values (which includes best-practice management and images of executives posted on multiple websites and procedures). social media platforms prior to a quarterly earnings release. Such cases are not usually publicized. COMMON ONLINE REPUTATION THREATS FACING U.S. COMPANIES Common sources of threats include retaliation from severed business, social or personal relationships (most Examples of online reputation threats that are com- often dissatisfied or dismissed employees), but also monly experienced by companies and organizations in competitors, industry bloggers who will benefit from the U.S. include: the attention they receive, unhappy customers whose • Public databases publishing executives’ home attempts to assuage their complaints through company addresses and information on family members. Once channels have failed, individuals or groups with dif- this information appears on one database, it is often ferent political or social views, or simply anonymous harvested and disseminated through other outlets. “trolls” (people who cultivate discord on the Internet This is not just a privacy issue; it can pose security by posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic mes- risks as well. sages in an online community). • Publication of privileged emails and internal com- Some threats can propagate online for months before pany documents that were leaked by inside sources. being noticed. Most start on lower pages of Google and can take weeks to rise to a prominent position on • Organized online defamation campaigns. page one of a . Often company leader- • Being the subject of domain squatting: Registering ship becomes aware of them only when a crisis point or using a domain name (“[your name].com”), then is reached and it threatens to disrupt a brand or an offering to sell the domain to the person or company individual’s credibility. who owns the trademark at an inflated price. Cyber security experts are often turned to in such • The impersonation of executives on social media and situations. The communications departments of other online platforms. This can be a particularly some companies, or executives charged with manag- damaging offshoot of domain squatting. It can be ing a firm’s reputation (a growing practice), are also prevented by reserving appropriate handles in major resources used to mitigate such issues. In some cases social media platforms. Donald Trump was the CEOs or another C-Suite executive ask their security subject of such an attack, and successfully sued for directors to conduct an investigation to unearth the removal of the websites. (Draznin, Haley, 2014) identity of the perpetrator. Forensic cyber investigators,

The New Demands of Online Reputation Management

NATIONAL CYBERSECURITY INSTITUTE JOURNAL | VOLUME 1, NO.2 3 which growing numbers of law firms and investigative substantial information about Internet legal rights. companies employ, can often identify the individual (www.eff.org) This is an excerpt from its Bloggers’ responsible for posting defamatory and other inappro- FAQ on Online Defamation Law, found in its Legal priate content online. In some cases they partner with Guide for Bloggers’ section: cyber specialists in law enforcement, particularly when What is defamation? they have relationships with that sector due to prior employment with Federal agencies such as the Secret Generally, defamation is a false and unprivileged Service or F.B.I. However, not all such posters can be statement of fact that is harmful to someone’s easily identified. reputation, and published “with fault,” mean- ing as a result of negligence or malice. State laws It can be difficult to locate legal information suf- often define defamation in specific ways. Libel is ficiently informative to indicate whether an online a written defamation; slander is a spoken defama- reputation issue meets the legal requirements of tion. “defamatory” that are necessary to take legal action. Not all companies (or individuals) want to take such What are the elements of a defamation claim? public action, either. An example of one successful law- suit occurred in 2013, when a Harvard graduate was The elements that must be proved to establish charged with online , impersonation and harass- defamation are: ment.(Leland, John, 2013) 1. a publication to one other than the person One useful reference source for Internet legal infor- defamed; mation is the Chilling Effects Clearinghouse, a 2. a false statement of fact; joint project of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Harvard, Stanford, Berkeley, University of San 3. that is understood as Francisco, University of Maine, George Washington a. being of and concerning the plaintiff; and School of Law, and Santa Clara University School of Law clinics. This excerpt from their website explains b. tending to harm the reputation of plaintiff. their point of view: If the plaintiff is a public figure, he or she must Chilling Effects aims to help you understand also prove actual malice. the protections that the First Amendment and Google Executive Chairman and Google intellectual property laws give to your online Ideas Director Jared Cohen address issues of defama- activities. We are excited about the new oppor- tion and privacy in The New Digital Age: Reshaping tunities the Internet offers individuals to express the Future of People, Nations and Business (Knopf, their views, parody politicians, celebrate their 2013): favorite movie stars, or criticize businesses. But we’ve noticed that not everyone feels the same Smear campaigns and online feuds typically way. Anecdotal evidence suggests that some involve public figures, not ordinary citizens…our individuals and corporations are using intellectual ability to influence and control how we are per- property and other laws to silence other online ceived by others will decrease dramatically.…The users. Chilling Effects encourages respect for shift from having one’s identity shaped off-line intellectual property law, while frowning on and projected online to an identity that is fash- its misuse to “chill” legitimate activity. ioned online and experienced off-line will have (www.chillingeffects.com) implications for citizens, states and companies as they navigate the new digital world….Identity Their extensive Boolean-format database provides will be the most valuable commodity for citizens quick searches of an exhaustive range of topics. The in the future, and it will exist primarily online. Electronic Frontier Foundation’s website also has (Schmidt, E., Cohen, J., 2013, pp. 32-36)

The New Demands of Online Reputation Management

NATIONAL CYBERSECURITY INSTITUTE JOURNAL | VOLUME 1, NO.2 4 DATA SCRAPING RESULTS IN SERIOUS Effective planning can protect a company against PRIVACY INVASIONS many reputational threats. Reactive ORM techniques are increasingly focused on the production of quality Data scraping – the automated collection, indexing content. The manipulation of search engine results— and publishing of online data– results in vast amounts what used to be considered the central activity of of personal information about millions of individu- ORM firms—cannot be guaranteed as search engine als being available in “people” databases like Intelius algorithms have grown more sophisticated and are con- and Spokeo, which package and sell it for nomi- tinually being updated. nal amounts ($10 or less). Many people, including high-profile targets, do not even realize their home The best policies integrate strong security measures addresses, ages and family members’ names are widely with a strategic and ongoing engagement with the available on such sites. But it can lead to serious physi- Internet. Building a strong and authentic online pres- cal security risks. ence not only allows a company to avert or respond to reputational crises; it is also a very effective way to CONCLUSION build a brand and relationships with customers.

The best tactics for avoiding many of those crises are REFERENCES CITED proactive. They include online monitoring of the com- pany‘s and executives’ online presence, as well as social Connelly, Christopher (2012, December 23). Mug Shot Websites media sites maintained by executives’ family members. Charge When You’re Charged, For Now. NPR. Retrieved from Numerous social media monitoring companies now http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/12/23/167916738/ provide such services, and Google alerts can be set up mug-shot-websites-charge-when-youre-charged-for-now (for free) to monitor any keyword. (Due to a poten- Draznin, Haley (2014, March 2). Trump awarded damages in tially high volume of daily alerts that may come into ‘cybersquatting’ case over domain names. CNN. Retrieved from email boxes, setting up a designated email address just http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/01/studentnews/trump-cybers- to receive alerts is recommended.) Company executives quatting-lawsuit/ in particular should be made aware of online secu- rity practices, including protecting their data, using Krause, Kevin (2014, March 27), Former resident charged encryption for online correspondence and ensuring with extortion for threatening to destroy client’s online reputa- they avoid letting emails sit in their and other tion. The Dallas Morning News. Retrieved from http://crimeblog. dallasnews.com/2014/03/texas-man-charged-with-extortion-for- personal email boxes. Such emails are not only hack- threatening-to-destroy-a-former-clients-online-reputation.html/ ing targets, but can lead to the type of career-ending crisis as happened to General Petraeus. VIPs, includ- Leland, John (2013, February 16). Online Battle Over Sacred ing industry leaders, should place their real estate Scrolls, Real-World Consequences. The New York Times. holdings in private trusts and buy any new properties Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/17/nyregion/ through those trusts, which will help keep their private online-battle-over-ancient-scrolls-spawns-real-world-conse- addresses from publicly available databases. quences.html?ref=nyregion&_r=1&#comments The most important tool for protecting against repu- Schmidt, E., Cohen, J. (2013). The New Digital Age: Reshaping tational crises is establishing a strong online presence. the Future of People, Nations and Business. New York: Knopf. For companies, this should include forums where company representatives interact directly with custom- SHANNON M. WILKINSON is founder and CEO of ers to address grievances. Statistics show that the more Reputation Communications, which provides online options consumers have to air grievances in online set- reputation management services to CEOs, industry leaders, tings provided by organizations, the less likely they are the C-Suite, VIPs and their organizations. to vent in public forums, which can produce viral (and possibly justified) rants. Contact: [email protected] www.reputation-communications.com

The New Demands of Online Reputation Management

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