Received this via, E-Mail this morning...
Quite interesting reading!!!
If anyone is interested in subscribing to ScamBusters, let me know?
This month we have a real treat for you. We've asked our
colleague, Dan Janal, to write a guest issue of Internet
ScamBusters. Dan is going to show you how companies can find
out if they are being attacked on the Web. He gives a
step-by-step guide to using dejanews and search engines to find
out what - if any - lies are being spread in the newsgroups and
on attack Web sites.
So, let's get going...
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
How to Deal with Lies About Your Company (and You) on the
Internet
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
By Daniel Janal
Are your enemies saying nasty things about your company? Are
misconceptions and downright falsehoods being posted online
without your knowledge?
If so, you could be losing a lot of business... and the
goodwill you fought so hard to obtain.
Internet ScamBusters readers should be aware of these problems
because they could seriously affect their profits, stock prices
and sales. PR practitioners call these pages "attack sites" -
or "rogue sites" - and they can affect companies of every size.
Consider the case of a company engaged in a long, difficult
strike with its union. One day, the PR manager searched for new
information about the strike on a search engine. He found a
site that contained several pieces of lies and misinformation,
including a purported TV interview with the local anchorman and
the president of the union. The transcript was totally
fabricated. The interview never took place. The transcript
contained misleading and false statements. However, anyone who
read the page would have thought the information was true. How
would they know differently? Clearly, the page had to come down.
The PR manager called the company lawyer and began to plan a
strategy. They looked at the page but couldn't find any contact
information. But they looked at the source code for the page
(which you can do by using the browser toolbar to "view page
source" in Netscape or "view document source" in Explorer).
They didn't find a name or phone number of the person who
posted the page, but they did find an e-mail address.
They went to Dejanews, www.dejanews.com, a search engine for
newsgroup messages. They typed in the e-mail address and found
many messages posted by that user. She was an avid poster in
the cancer survivors group, the blues music group and the
weddings group. And while she hadn't put her name on the
offending union Web page, she did tell everyone her name and
phone number in her newsgroup messages!
The lawyer and PR person noticed one more thing: the Web page
was not posted on a union site, but on a real estate agency's
site. They did a little research offline and found out that the
person who posted the page worked in real estate for the
company whose Web site hosted the offending pages.
Armed with this knowledge, the lawyer called the woman. The
conversation went something like this:
"Hello. We know you had breast cancer. Your favorite blues
artist is B.B. King and your daughter is getting married in
July. We also know you posted a Web page filled with
inaccuracies about the union. If you don't take the page down
within one hour, we will call your boss, who probably will not
be too happy to know you have put her license in jeopardy by
posting libelous information on her Web site. We will call the
state realty board and tell them you are spreading libelous
information, which is probably a violation of your license. And
we will call the anchorman and show him the interview you
created. By the way, we copied the pages so if we need to go to
court or to the state realty board, we can."
Within five minutes, she had taken down the page.
Sadly, this case is not alone. Many companies are falling
victim to activists who have targeted companies because of
their stance on the environment, animal rights, abortion and
political causes. One person is going around telling people
that a sugar substitute can cause cancer, although she has no
proof. Other companies, like Lexis-Nexis, Tommy Hilfiger, and
Nieman Marcus have been victims of rumors that were spread via
e-mail by well intentioned people who simply had heard or read
lies, and then urged a boycott by all their friends and
colleagues.
What can you do to protect your company?
Here are seven steps:
1. Monitor the newsgroups and search engines at least once a
week. Check for company names and product names. If your
company is very visible, check the names of the CEO or
president as well.
2. If you find postings in newsgroups, read all the messages
about the subject and determine if you need to respond. In some
cases, the issue dies, or smarter minds call the poster to
verify his information. This happens a lot in stock newsgroups!
3. If you think you need to respond to set the record straight,
dive right in! Newsgroup netiquette forbids advertising in
newsgroups, but not the honest exchange of information. In
fact, if you don't state your side of the story, people might
assume that silence is assent!
4. Contact the original poster directly and see if you can work
out the problem. Maybe there was some miscommunication that
went haywire. Many people are reasonable. In fact, some of the
biggest fans for companies were once people who had customer
service problems that were set straight. Before you call or
write, see if the person posted other messages in other
newsgroups. Dejanews provides links to all messages the person
posted. If you read the messages, you might begin to see how
you can develop rapport with that person, or if the person is
whacko! One search I conducted for a client showed the e-mailer
to have belonged to several hate groups! That case would
require a different strategy than if he belonged to
professional scientific organizations.
5. If you find a rogue Web site, see if you can talk to the
Webmaster and find out what the problem is. If they received
bad customer service or bought a faulty product, take note.
They probably speak for many people who have had similar
problems with your company. In this case, your problem is
really inside your company. If you straighten that out, the
page will probably die out. If you don't, the page will live
forever, like U.S. Worst, www.usworst.com, an attack page for
U.S. West, a telecommunications giant. People can post their
own horror stories on the site, or find out the home phone
number of the chairman of the company so they can complain
directly to him!
6. It is hard to threaten a rogue Web site master because they
are protected by the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom
of speech. However, they are subject to the same laws of libel
as in the real world. So if they are spreading false
information, and they know it is false, then you could bring
suit against them to shut them down.
7. Be sure to copy the pages on to your computer and print them
out on paper. This is your evidence. If you don't and they
remove the offending material, you won't have any proof of the
libel. Programs like WebWhacker and WebBuddy can copy entire
sites, including the text, pictures and HTML.
These tips should help protect your company - and you - from
attacks on the Internet.
About the guest author: Daniel Janal is president of Janal
Communications, an Internet marketing agency and the author of
"Risky Business: Protect Your Company from Being Stalked,
Conned or Blackmailed on the Web" which was named as one of
the 30 best business books of 1998. |
