Public relations
Management of public communication of organizations
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We include updates on People's Television Network, Alejandra Silva, Astroturfing, Thank You for Smoking, Greenwashing, 2017 United Express passenger removal, Kompromat, Receptionist, The Century of the Self, Attaché, Press release, Cherry picking, Lawfare, 50 Cent Party, Russian web brigades, Stakeholder theory ... and more.
| 2025 |
Social bot
Meta announced plans to create an AI product enabling users to generate AI characters on Instagram and Facebook, with capabilities to create bios, profile pictures, and generate AI-powered content.
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| 2025 |
Greenwashing
Modi inaugurated the Vantara zoo, claiming it as the world's largest zoo for rescued animals, which was described as a potential greenwashing attempt for his and his party's international image.
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| 2025 |
Greenwashing
During the Kumbh Mela in Prayagraj, Hindutva leader Yogi Adityanath dismissed the National Green Tribunal's report on Ganga river pollution as 'fake' and an attempt to mock Hindu faith.
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| 2025 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
The Wikipedia community's discussion about documenting The North Face incident became a topic of discussion in Slate magazine.
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| January 1 2025 |
Social bot
Meta's AI bot accounts begin to be publicly identified on social media platforms, with users noting these bots are unblockable and have blue verification ticks, indicating Meta's official verification.
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| 2024 |
Lawfare
During the Vancouver International Security Summit, Cynthia Alkon, a law professor from Texas A&M University, discusses lawfare and delivers insights on the first university class on lawfare in the United States.
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| 2024 |
Lawfare
Scott McGregor, a former military and RCMP intelligence official, shares his experience of facing a defamation claim from a group associated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at the Vancouver International Security Summit, highlighting a practical example of lawfare.
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| 2024 |
Greenwashing
New EU reporting rules take effect, mandating companies with over 250 staff to disclose environmental, social, and governance (ESG) information to combat greenwashing.
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| 2024 |
Greenwashing
Turkey's Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Alparslan Bayraktar announced government plans to increase coal mining while claiming to do so in an 'environmentally friendly' manner, which represents a clear example of greenwashing in the coal industry.
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| September 18 2024 |
Social bot
Michael Sayman creates SocialAI, an app designed exclusively for chatting with AI bots without human interaction. The app is linked to discussions about the Dead Internet Theory by Ars Technica.
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| August 2024 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
Portland city commissioner and mayoral candidate Rene Gonzalez spent $6,400 of city funds to improve his Wikipedia page, hiring WhiteHatWiki consultant through his policy advisor Harrison Kass. The city's auditor found this use of public funds violated campaign finance regulations.
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| June 2024 |
Greenwashing
The Federal Constitutional Court of Germany ruled that companies must precisely define the term 'climate neutral' in advertising or be prohibited from using the phrase due to its vagueness.
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| May 2024 |
Greenwashing
The Financial Conduct Authority introduced new anti-greenwashing rules targeting sustainability claims made by regulated firms in financial product and service marketing.
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| February 2024 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
The Scottish Sun and The National reported that Scottish Parliament computers were used to edit Wikipedia articles of multiple MSPs, particularly focusing on Alex Cole-Hamilton's page, to delete compromising information and emphasize positive aspects.
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| 2023 |
Greenwashing
European Commission introduced a proposal for ESG regulation to enhance transparency and integrity in ESG rating.
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| 2023 |
Astroturfing
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis appointed Moms for Liberty founder Tina Descovich to the Florida State Commission on Ethics.
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| June 2023 |
Greenwashing
Marc Owen Jones of Hamad Bin Khalifa University noted the use of apparently fake Twitter profiles defending Al Jaber's COP28 presidency.
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| June 26 2023 |
Greenwashing
Reuters reports on new rules designed to combat corporate greenwashing, indicating increasing regulatory efforts to address misleading environmental claims by companies.
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| May 2023 |
Greenwashing
A Wikipedia user alleged to be an ADNOC employee suggested edits to Sultan Al Jaber's Wikipedia page to present him as a climate movement supporter.
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| May 2023 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
Mediaite reported that American Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy paid a Wikipedia editor to remove potentially damaging details from his biography.
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| February 2023 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
The Signpost reported on conflict-of-interest editing concerning Indian billionaire industrialist Gautam Adani, which was subsequently covered by multiple Indian news outlets.
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| February 2023 | Team Jorge is publicly exposed by an international consortium of investigative journalists from Israel and France, coordinated by Forbidden Stories, revealing the organization's extensive election manipulation activities. |
| February 16 2023 | India's Congress Party publicly demanded an investigation into Team Jorge's potential interference in Indian elections, with party spokesperson Pawan Khera and social media head Supriya Shrinate highlighting concerns about online disinformation and electoral manipulation. |
| January 2023 | Media presenter M'Barki was suspended during an inquiry by international investigative reporting teams for broadcasting segments potentially created by Team Jorge without editor approval. |
| 2022 |
Greenwashing
The World Federation of Advertisers released six new guidelines for advertisers to prevent greenwashing and encourage credible environmental claims.
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| 2022 | Undercover journalists conduct a sting operation in Tel Aviv, secretly recording interactions with Tal Hanan, the group's leader, to expose Team Jorge's methods. |
| 2022 | Team Jorge ran a campaign claiming the Polisario Front has ties to Hezbollah and Iran. |
| 2022 | Tal Hanan demonstrated the ability to hack Dennis Itumbi's Telegram account during the Kenyan general election, which was confirmed by Itumbi himself. |
| 2022 | Team Jorge conducted a disinformation campaign called #RIP_Emmanuel, creating a death hoax about social media personality Emmanuel the emu, which resulted in over 1,300 tweets. |
| May 2022 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
Haaretz reported on conflict-of-interest editing, primarily focusing on edits involving Russian oligarchs.
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| April 11 2022 |
Astroturfing
BBC published an investigation revealing a network of pro-Putin Facebook groups with over 650,000 members, demonstrating a coordinated astroturfing campaign using inauthentic accounts to create the appearance of widespread support for Putin during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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| 2021 |
Greenwashing
MSCI upgraded McDonald's ESG rating by removing the significance of greenhouse gas emissions and highlighting a recycling initiative, despite the company's emissions being comparable to a mid-size EU country like Portugal.
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| 2021 |
Greenwashing
Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced a tree planting campaign in the desert as part of a plan to reach carbon neutrality by 2060, which was criticized as potential greenwashing by climate scientists.
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| 2021 |
Greenwashing
The United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) was condemned by environmental activists as a greenwashing event.
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| 2021 |
Greenwashing
Coca-Cola was sued by the Earth Island Institute for making false environmental claims about plastic waste reduction.
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| November 2021 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
The Guardian reported on conflict-of-interest editing related to billionaire Richard Desmond, highlighting long-standing attempts by his lawyers to remove the description of him as a 'pornographer' from his Wikipedia article.
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| October 2021 |
Greenwashing
McDonald's was accused of greenwashing after announcing a pledge to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.
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| September 2021 |
Greenwashing
The UK's Competition and Markets Authority published the Green Claims Code to protect consumers from misleading environmental claims and ensure fair business competition in environmental marketing.
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| August 2021 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
A plant-based food company called This replaced images on the Bacon Wikipedia article with their own products, which were quickly reverted and resulted in the account being blocked.
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| April 2021 |
Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia
In response to criticism from Wikipedia editors about potential bias, the ADL suspended its Wikipedia page editing project.
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| February 2021 |
Astroturfing
Moms for Liberty was covered by Breitbart, a far-right news publication, further amplifying their visibility.
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| January 2021 |
Greenwashing
European Commission, in cooperation with national consumer protection authorities, published a report revealing 42 percent of investigated consumer websites likely had false and misleading green claims.
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| January 2021 |
Astroturfing
A systematic study revealed a set of human-looking bot accounts capable of automatically posting political content on social media for fourteen days, creating 1,586 posts before being detected and suspended by Twitter.
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| January 27 2021 |
Astroturfing
The organization was featured on the Rush Limbaugh show, gaining early media exposure in right-wing circles.
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| January 21 2021 |
Astroturfing
Moms for Liberty was founded as a 501(c)(4) 'social welfare' nonprofit organization dedicated to parental rights advocacy.
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| 2020 |
Social bot
University of Pretoria introduced a method using Benford's Law for predicting frequency distribution of leading digits to detect malicious bots online
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| 2020 |
Greenwashing
Start of DG FISMA's 2020-2024 agenda focusing on addressing greenwashing and balancing sustainable investment capital with investor protection.
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| 2020 |
Greenwashing
Break Free From Plastic identified Coca-Cola as the world's number one plastic polluter.
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| 2020 |
Greenwashing
A European Union study found that over 50% of examined environmental claims were vague, misleading, or unfounded, with 40% being unsubstantiated.
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This contents of the box above is based on material from the Wikipedia articles Social bot, Greenwashing, Conflict-of-interest editing on Wikipedia, Team Jorge, Astroturfing & Lawfare, which are released under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.