Facebook Busted in Clumsy Smear on Google
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Facebook Busted in
Clumsy Smear on Google
by Dan Lyons
The social network secretly hired a PR firm to plant negative stories
about the search giant, The Daily Beast's Dan Lyons reveals—a caper
that is blowing up in their face, and escalating their war. Plus, more on
the ensuing blame game and the PR hacks who did the job.
For the past few days, a mystery has been unfolding in Silicon Valley. Somebody, it
seems, hired Burson-Marsteller, a top public-relations firm, to pitch anti-Google stories
to newspapers, urging them to investigate claims that Google was invading people’s
privacy. Burson even offered to help an influential blogger write a Google-bashing op-
ed, which it promised it could place in outlets like The Washington Post, Politico, and
The Huffington Post.
The plot backfired when the blogger turned down Burson’s offer and posted the emails
that Burson had sent him. It got worse when USA Today broke a story accusing
Burson of spreading a thank
No, “whisper
you.campaign” about Google “on behalf of an unnamed
Read www.TheDailyBeast.com
client.” How Sequels Are Killing the
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But who was the mysterious unnamed client? While fingers pointed at Apple and by Roger Ebert
Microsoft, The Daily Beast discovered that it's a company nobody suspected—
Dominique Strauss-Kahn's
Facebook. Arrest and Political Fallout
by Christopher Dickey
Confronted with evidence, a Facebook spokesman last night confirmed
that Facebook hired Burson, citing two reasons: first, it believes
The Right-Wing Talk-Radio
Google is doing some things in social networking that raise privacy Flameout
concerns; second, and perhaps more important, Facebook resents by John Av lon
Google’s attempts to use Facebook data in its own social-networking
service.
Like a Cold War spy case made public, the PR fiasco reveals—and Supreme Court: Police Don't
Need Warrant
ratchets up—the growing rivalry between Google and Facebook.
Uphold warrantless entry
Google, the search giant, views Facebook as a threat, and has been where police followed pot
determined to fight back by launching a social-networking system of its smell.
own. So far, however, Google has not had much luck, but Facebook
nonetheless felt it necessary to return fire—clandestinely. Strauss-Kahn Sent to
Rikers Island
$1M bail offer denied.
Here were two guys from one of the biggest PR
U.S. Accelerates Taliban
agencies in the world, blustering around Silicon Valley Talks
like a pair of Keystone Kops. No longer requires
Pakistan's permission.
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Facebook hired a priv ate PR company to plant negativ e Google stories in the press. Credit: MY DAILY
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STYLELIST
At issue in this latest skirmish is a Google tool called Social Circle, which lets people
Kerry Campbell, Mom Who
with Gmail accounts see information not only about their friends but also about the Gives 8-Year-Old Botox,
friends of their friends, which Google calls “secondary connections.” Burson, in its Being Investigated by Child
Welfare Services
pitch to journalists, claimed Social Circle was “designed to scrape private data and
build deeply personal dossiers on millions of users—in a direct and flagrant violation of
[Google's] agreement with the FTC.”
The PR Hacks Behind
Also from Burson: “The American people must be made aware of the now immediate Facebook's Google Smear
by Dan Ly ons
intrusions into their deeply personal lives Google is cataloging and broadcasting every
minute of every day—without their permission.”
Facebook Smear Blame
Game
Chris Soghoian, a blogger Burson offered to help write an op-ed, says Burson was
by Dan Ly ons
“making a mountain out of molehill,” and that Social Circle isn’t dangerous.
Microsoft Will Screw Up
Soghoian asked Burson directly what company was paying the agency to spread this Skype
stuff around. Burson wouldn’t say. Miffed, Soghoian published their email exchange by Dan Ly ons
online. You can see it here.
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comThe story gained wider attention when USA Today reported that two PR flacks from
Burson—former CNBC tech reporter Jim Goldman, and John Mercurio, a former
political reporter—had been pushing reporters at USA Today and other outlets to write
Lindsay Lohan Tweets Photo
stories and editorials claiming Google was violating people’s privacy with Social Circle. of Man She Says Is Stalking
Her (Report)
USA Today looked into it, but decided the claims were exaggerated—at which point,
Goldman ran for cover. “After Goldman’s pitch proved largely untrue, he subsequently Jon Stewart Debates Bill
O'Reilly About Rapper
declined USA Today’s requests for comments,” the paper reported. Common's Appearance at
White House Event
The mess, seemingly worthy of a Nixon reelection campaign, is embarrassing for
Facebook, which has struggled at times to brand itself as trustworthy. But even more
so for Burson-Marsteller, a huge PR firm that has represented lots of blue-chip
corporate clients in its 58-year history. Mark Penn, Burson’s CEO, has been a political
consultant for Bill Clinton, and is best known as the chief strategist in HIllary Clinton’s Trump opts out of 2012: A
mockery roundup
2008 presidential campaign.
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Out of the Closet and into the
Headlines
May 12, 2011 | 12:07am
» E.L. Rothschild and Weather Central Launch MyWeather ‘How I Met Your Mother’
finale: Guess who’s getting
» Endeavour Launch: NASA's Final Countdown married!
» The PR Firm Facebook Hired to Smear Google
‘Dancing With the Stars’:
» The PR Hacks Behind Facebook's Google Smear
Semifinals are liiiiiiiiiiiive!
» Facebook Smear Blame Game
Would you watch ‘Law &
Order: SVU’ without Mariska
Hargitay? (What if Jennifer
Love Hewitt replaced her?)
Technology , Facebook , Apple , Google , Mark Zuckerberg , Microsoft , Usa Today , Social Netw orking ,
Privacy , Bloggers , Larry Page , Pr , Burson-marsteller , Google Facebook Pop Culture Female BFFs
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Collapse Replies 1 2 3 4 sort by date:
johnj77
Facebook hired Burson-Marsteller to get anti-google stories out in the press. Since
Enter your Email Address
you included all of their complaints, they accomplished that with this article and the
articles that will cover this story.
3:01 am, May 12, 2011 (2) | | |
jkillough
I know, totally post-modern PR.
1:48 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
bgeasyas123
Not really, since the article makes it pretty clear that the complaints weren't
valid.
2:11 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
Gaetano Marano
Google does worse things! like this one: http://x.co/GqFF
8:10 am, May 12, 2011 (4) | | |
Caboose221
that's not worse, even if the idea was stolen (which I doubt) its nothing like one
of the biggest online advertisers doing a petty act like this towards its
competitor.
9:11 am, May 12, 2011 | |
threesides2everystory
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comI'm sure you feel slighted about something. But your website looks like it was
created by a kindergartener. It hurt my eyes so much I couldn't be bothered to
read it.
Good luck with all that.
9:24 am, May 12, 2011 | |
DeniseEspinosa
Seeing continued erosion in Facebook's core business (collecting data)
and a step-up in privacy invasion (selling what they collect).
Private company trading its unregistered shares to ordinary people??
Where are you Congress? Time to take 'em down.
11:10 am, May 12, 2011 (2) | | |
skysis
That's not the Congress' concern and it shouldn't be. If you don't want your
info out there, cancel your account with facebook. It's that simple.
3:57 pm, May 12, 2011 |
DeniseEspinosa
Never had one (an authentic identity...)
Never will.
You've all been duped.
7:37 pm, May 12, 2011 |
Pita22
The website looks like it was created by a kidnapper trying to piece together a
ransom note from newspaper clippings! Too much highlighting - too many font
colors and sizes - no class at all!
3:23 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comGaetano Marano
Google does worse things! like this one: x.co/GqFF
8:12 am, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
choptop13
That is the worst looking website I've ever seen my life.
3:02 pm, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
tmaxr1
That was a website?
I thought my computer was throwing up. Thanks.
6:01 pm, May 12, 2011 |
Spam Ratings
This is a interesting fight to get to the top. It seems it is quite brutal up there!
With all this campaigning for 'do not track' I wonder how long it will be before targeted
advertising is stopped.
One way to stop being tracked is to not give these large website your real personal
details. Instead give things like temporary email addresses. Here are details on how
simple they are to use: http://www.spamratings.com/consumers/the-cleanzer-tour
8:16 am, May 12, 2011 | |
leslee
Facebook and Google aside, it's hard to believe a firm like B-M would participate is
something so shoddy. This is the kind of activity most firms would simply refuse to
do -- but I guess with a client the size of Facebook, it's hard for even the largest firm
to say no. Their ethics folks were certainly asleep at the wheel, but you'd think
anyone experienced in PR would be concerned enough about exactly this kind of fall-
out to politely decline. Wonder if anyone tried to talk FB out of it.
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.com8:46 am, May 12, 2011 (3) | | |
bgeasyas123
Yeah, because politics is such a squeaky clean business for these guys......PR
firms have become nothing more than mud-slingers. Companies/people don't hire
them to get a positive light on themselves, but to cast doubts about the
competition.
Seems like our country is will to accept "the least damaging" as opposed to the
best and brightest.
2:14 pm, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
rminetor
Don't know what PR firm you work for, bgeasyas, but mine would never, ever
agree to a scam like this, no matter who the client was. This is the kind of
thing that sinks a career and an agency in a heartbeat.
3:23 pm, May 12, 2011 |
tmaxr1
bWAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHH!
Burson-Marsteller ethical? The PR firm for mass-murderers and nuclear
meltdowns? The go-to guys if you just killed a hundred thousand in Bhopal or a
million in East Timor? Get a clue.
http://bursonmarstellerwatch.com/
5:47 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
spikey27
EVERYBODY has their price.
4:49 am, May 13, 2011 | |
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comNisha59
Oh please! B-M are pretty shoddy. They do whatever they are asked to do and were
Hillary Clinton's Waterloo.
9:18 am, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
shirlyujest
So agree with your comment. All one has to do is take a look at that Penn guy
to get the creepy crawlies. Anything, anything for a $$$$$$.
9:41 am, May 12, 2011 | |
lumnights
More "top-tier" Americans showing us that they are immune to guilt, have no
conscience, and little sense of morality. I remember when being willing to do
anything for money was a bad thing; today, it's business as usual.
9:32 am, May 12, 2011 | |
menckenlite
Aside from the privacy issues about which there is a new book How Google Thinks,
Works, and Shapes Our Lives
By Steven Levy; this report verifies the notion that news is largely managed. If the PR
firm (only one of many) can get an essay "placed" in major media outlets what does
that say about what gets published?
9:32 am, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
rminetor
I've been a PR professional for 30 years, and I can tell you from long experience
that this has been going on for a long, long time. A great deal of news is
"placed," both in the trades and in mass media. What's changed is that it's so
easy to find out what's real and what's a placement, because the paper trail (or
email trail) is all there and intact. All that's new about this is that B-M got
caught. Bravo.
3:26 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comSistagirl Young
Now boys and girls is this the way we really want to behave? Greed pretty much
sums up what all the whooping and hollering is about. P R. firm, accusations of he
said she said. Deny,deny and deny again. Good Lord, is it worth it? Yes it is. Look
at all the machinations of the parties envolved. FACEBOOK, GOOGLE. How long
before the other "big-boys" get into the fracas? The love of money once again rears
it's ugly head. Tsk.Tsk.Tsk
10:07 am, May 12, 2011 (2) | | |
DeniseEspinosa
Google good. "Dasn't does EVIL"
Facebook bad
Facebook broke the golden rule: IS EVIL.
You've all been duped.
11:12 am, May 12, 2011 | |
skysis
What does this have to do with the love of money?
4:03 pm, May 12, 2011 | |
StoopidPR
Jim Goldman is such a tool. I'm surprised he even has a job as I don't know anyone
who would take a "pitch" from him without laughing and its credibility. Now that he's
blown Facebook's cover, can he work in PR ever again? Certainly he's (been) done in
journalism.
10:15 am, May 12, 2011 | |
Veronicaxy
The competition between these two companies is going to continue to heat up their
desire for our information, and there apparently are no meaningful laws to protect us.
I was just at a conference featuring a few Google employees. It wasn't good. They
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comcame off as sociopaths: arrogant, dropping extremely crude language, demeaning to
those who asked questions, reveling in their power and unapologetic if they're
pushing the boundaries of privacy -- sorry you aren't comfortable they have a
business to make successful. And these are the employees Google chooses as
corporate representatives?
There are few if any meaningful laws protecting you from FB, Google and the legions
of developers that create products for them that also tap into your private data via
APIs. An attorney in the audience pointed that out to all of us during that conference,
the last laws written on digital privacy where written in the '80s, far ahead of being
able to comprehend the capabilities they have today.
One other person mentioned that countries are now in a heated competition to
become the next equivalent of a data Switzerland. Where can you do your data
collection, mining and exchanges without the pesky scrutiny of a friendly
government? The internet makes it pretty seamless to operate your data centers
where laws are very friendly for the businesses running them.
One Google employee leading a talk announced over 1 million Gmail accounts are
hacked everyday, and those are only then ones they know about. When asked why
hackers would bother he said some hackers were using the info they found to
blackmail people who were having affairs, etc. That's how little control they have over
your privacy even when they try.
Last year a Google engineer named Barksdale was busted for using his access to
email accounts to find young boys to create a small social circle, with him as the
ringleader. When he started bullying some of the boys, parents caught on. He was
fired only after he was reported to the company according to Gawker. Luckily he
wasn't a sexual predator. Bet you didn't hear about it, I couldn't believe how little
press picked up on the story, but you can ironically Google it.
As for FB, when they positioned my needing to give them a great deal more of my
private data as a *security* measure I went into my account and zapped everything I
could. That was worthy of inclusion in the novel 1984.
If you're relying on these companies self-protectiveness to keep their brand positive
as your safety net you are naive about the pressures of competition and what that
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comdoes to individual employees as well as executives looking to be the winner of the
next great idea that makes money and furthers their career.
We need international laws that define what they cannot do with information about us
and what's required of them minimally to protect our security. They've act as if
they've got too much of the market cornered to be concerned about the few that
understand and are voicing concern, and the average person isn't demanding more
from them or the government -- yet. We should be.
10:18 am, May 12, 2011 (2) | | |
knowlengr
If the Google employees were as arrogant as you say, better to "out" them by
publishing the names and an exact transcript of what was said - obscenities at
all. Vague accusations instead tend to undermine the accuser's standing.
2:54 pm, May 12, 2011 (1) | | |
Veronicaxy
Whoo hit a nerve!
An interesting complete miss of the actual point. I'm very clear in my
accusation of Google and FB and the lack of pressure we consumers are
putting on them and our governments.
And honey I might be a woman but I'm not a stenographer, sorry.
12:57 am, May 13, 2011 |
mikenon
Everything you wrote is unsubstantiated. Where are your fellow conference
attendees writing about 1 million gmail accounts hacked daily, with the intent of
blackmailing people? Where? Nowhere. That's where. Because you're making it
up.
Re: Barksdale, "David Barksdale had used his clearance to access private data
of multiple people, including four minors." does not equal "using his access to
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.comemail accounts to find young boys to create a small social circle, with him as
the ringleader." Google has existed for 10 years, and has 20,000 employees.
Barksdale is 1 of 2 people fired for inappropriately accessing data. Those are
odds all companies would be happy to have, no matter their size. Bad apples
happen, get over it. "but you can ironically Google it." No, that's not ironic.
Several websites covered the situation, and Google search catalogs websites to
display as results. If anything, it's business as usual. By the way, Gawker is a
tabloid rag, if that's where you get your news, I've found your problem.
International laws regarding user privacy do no need to be written. Instead,
people who want to use the Internet need to pass a test of basic knowledge.
People too stupid to understand the issues at hand don't deserve access. The
Internet is not a right, it's a privilege, and should be treated as such.
Reiterating knowlengr, here's some of your vague accusations:
1. "They came off as sociopaths: arrogant, dropping extremely crude language,
demeaning to those who asked questions, reveling in their power and
unapologetic if they're pushing the boundaries of privacy"
2. "One Google employee leading a talk announced over 1 million Gmail
accounts are hacked everyday, and those are only then ones they know about."
3. "One other person mentioned that countries are now in a heated competition
to become the next equivalent of a data Switzerland."
No names, no details, just vague, unsubstantiated, crap. The only thing you're
clear about is needing to be medicated
3:56 pm, May 13, 2011 | |
MajorDude
These are the people we trust with our information? I de-faced my Facebook page a
couple of years ago. I'm out.
10:39 am, May 12, 2011 | |
justed
Only fools use Facebook or would give Google their private information. This story
paints perfectly the reasons why...neither company is to be trusted.
open in browser customize free license pdfcrowd.com10:41 am, May 12, 2011 | |
lisagems
"Confronted with evidence, a Facebook spokesman last night confirmed that
Facebook hired Burson, citing two reasons: First, because it believes Google is
doing some things in social networking that raise privacy concerns"
Really? really? Because Facebook is SOO concerned with protecting our privacy
that a security audit shows thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of users
information had been all but broadcast to advertisers and other sources of spam and
viruses.
10:42 am, May 12, 2011 | |
modestproposal
"The Daily Beast discovered that it's a company nobody suspected - Facebook.
Confronted with evidence, a Facebook spokesman last night confirmed..."
How do you write this entire article and not say what the evidence WAS?
10:54 am, May 12, 2011 | |
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