Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
ETHICAL AND
SOCIETAL ISSUES
Manipulating Cyberstatus
The Web provides an uncensored platform for public opinion.
Blogs, social networks, and other Web tools allow you to speak
your mind on any issue. Web sites such as complaints.com and
Ripoff Report provide an easy means to express dissatisfaction
with products and services. While this is generally viewed as a
positive aspect of the Internet, it has proved a challenge for
businesses looking to control their image. A disgruntled employee,
customer, or even a business competitor can plant seeds of
discontent on the Web that can quickly grow into a serious prob-
lem for a business's reputation. Cyberstatus is an important factor
in the success of a product or business.
Consider lock manufacturer Kryptonite, a company that has
a good reputation for manufacturing high-end bicycle locks. That
is, until their cyberstatus was knocked down several notches by
a blogger who revealed a secret for cracking an expensive
Kryptonite lock in seconds using a ballpoint pen. Within days the
word had spread to thousands of cyclists through online news
services and Kryptonite's entire business was in jeopardy. The
company quickly created a lock exchange program that replaced
over 400,000 locks in 21 countries for free. Kryptonite ultimately
was forced to redesign nine years worth of locks in ten months to
save its reputation.
Over the past few years, businesses have started using strate-
gies to control their cyberstatus. Controlling cyberstatus, however,
is like controlling radio signals—you can't prevent them from being
broadcast, but you can tune out the signals you don't want, and
tune in the signal you do want to hear. Tuning out harmful online
publicity for a business and focusing on good publicity is a practice
referred to as Online Reputation Management. Online Reputation
Management focuses on Search Engine Optimization (SEO)—
controlling the Web sites listed on the first page of Web search
engine results and using Web monitoring to track what is being
said about a company or product on blogs, forums, podcasts, and
comments on Web sites.
SEO is used to bump negative publicity such as customer com-
plaints out of top search results and load positive publicity in its
place, such as positive customer testimonials. Many consider SEO
to be “gaming the system.” SEO service providers learn how the
systems used by search giants such as Google, Yahoo!, and MSN
work and alter Web content to control search results. SEO compa-
nies conduct metadata analysis of a corporate Web site and make
suggestions about content and keyword tags to help a product or
company rise to the top of the search engine results. Without the
technology, the product might have been listed hundreds of entries
down in search results, where the public would never see it.
In a more ethically questionable technique called “Google
Bombing,” a number of bogus links to a particular Web site or
sites are created to make it appear more popular than it really is,
assuring it a higher ranking in Google. Google Bombing is often
used to attack a product, company, or person. For example, in
2008 a Google Bomb was launched against then presidential candi-
date John McCain. A political blogger encouraged fellow partisan
bloggers to link to nine negative newspaper articles about McCain.
The thousands of resulting links caused the negative articles to
rise to the top of search results when someone searched for the
name John McCain using the Google search engine.
Another technique in Online Reputation Management is to
monitor the Web for negative commentary and work to block it.
Online reputation management firms invest significant resources
in continuously monitoring the Web through a number of
techniques. Employees might be hired to monitor popular social
networks such as MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter,
watching for positive and negative commentary on a client. Auto-
mated natural language processing software may be employed to
watch for product and company names that come up through
search engine results. London-based Reputica Ltd provides its
clients with an online dashboard that displays the range of positive
and negative content about the company on the Web in the form of
graphs and statistics.
The faster a company can react to negative publicity, the more
it can control the damage. Often, an Online Reputation Manage-
ment company directly contacts the person posting the negative
comments and works to convince that person to voluntarily
remove the content. In other cases, the company might be able to
threaten a law suit. If the company has no leverage with which to
convince the person to remove the content, SEO is used to keep
the negative comments from the public.
The act of manipulating search engine results and exercising
control over Web content is not illegal. However, many question
the ethics of the practice. Internet purists feel that the Internet,
being an uncensored public network, should provide an accurate
account of true public sentiment. Businesses looking to control
their message to the public to maximize profits and competitive
advantage feel that they should be able to work within the legal
system to benefit their shareholders.
Discussion Questions
1.
Should businesses be allowed to manipulate search
engine results?
2.
Is the practice of eradicating negative publicity on the Web
ethically sound? What methods do you endorse?
Critical Thinking Questions
1.
What might the search engine companies do to minimize
SEO techniques?
2.
What forms of Web 2.0 technologies (blogs, social
networks, wikis) are less vulnerable to corporate
manipulation? Why?
SOURCES:
Hoffman, Thomas, “Online reputation management is hot—but is it
ethical?” Computerworld, February 12, 2008,
www.computerworld.com/
Havenstein, Heather, “Blogger launches 'Google bomb' at McCain,” Comput-
erworld, June 19, 2008,
www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?
Warner, Bernhard, “How to be unGoogleable,” TimesOnline, May 28, 2008,
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