Category Reputation Management

In today’s digital world, unauthorized use of content—such as images, videos, written work, or software—is a common issue. If someone has used your original content without permission, you may be able to remove it from the web using a DMCA takedown service. But how does the process actually work? Here’s a step-by-step guide to understanding how DMCA takedown services operate.

What Is the DMCA?

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a U.S. law enacted in 1998 to protect intellectual property rights on the internet. It gives content owners a legal way to request the removal of unauthorized content hosted on websites, platforms, or servers—without having to go to court.

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Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C. § 230(c), is an internet legislation that went into law in 1996. It basically states that any owner of public online forum is immune from liability as long as the owner are hands off.

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In this day and age, the Internet has an astonishing amount of power to enhance or sink people’s reputations. People have lost and gained jobs based on past Internet records and online behavior. If you want to make sure your reputation is strengthened and not undermined by Google searches and social media, here are a few things you should try.

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If you are a victim of cyberbullying, online abuse, or online harassment on X (formerly Twitter), you can take steps to remove abusive posts from the site. Acts of cyberbullying or harassment may be both against the law and against the site’s rules. Have online users invaded your privacy and ruined your reputation with posts such as revenge porn, spreading false rumors, or releasing personal information? The first step you can take is reporting the post to site admins.

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Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan on Oct. 21 announced that the agency’s ban on phony online reviews was going into effect, with penalties of $51,744 per violations.

On social media platform X, Khan urged followers to report the proscribed practices at reportfraud.ftc.gov. Announcing the rule this August, she said that fake reviews “not only waste people’s time and money, but also pollute the marketplace and divert business away from honest competitors.”

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Blogger (also known as Blogspot) is a widely used blogging platform owned by Google. It allows users to publish content to personal blogs easily and quickly, often ranking high in search engine results due to its popularity and keyword relevance. However, it’s possible for individuals to misuse Blogspot for posting harmful, false, or defamatory content. Here are methods to address and remove such content from Blogger.com.

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In today’s digital age, when someone is searching online for any type of business, the first website they seek out is Google. Regardless of the size of the company, the location or the industry, consumers will go to Google to learn more information about a particular company. In fact, some of the first things people may learn about a particular business will originate from what appears in a Google search. 

What does this mean for business owners? It means that having a positive online presence can go a long way. Business owners who are trying to gain customers through online searches should do everything in their power to promote positive brand awareness. One of the easiest ways to do this is by creating a Google My Business (GMB) profile for your company.

Businesses that have a complete GMB profile will show up through Google Search console, as well as appear on Maps when someone searches a given business name. Another feature that business owners can utilize through GMB is their automatic positive review sharing. This allows businesses to share suggested 4 and 5-star reviews as customer testimonials via Google Posts.  

When creating a Google Post, business owners can include a clever call to action with the link to a particular service page, which can strategically be used when sharing reviews. Also, posts can feature up to 10 images and videos, which can help add more context to a specific review when applicable. 

Is Google using a new Algorithm? Perhaps. Google watchers and online reputation management teams are reporting that Ripoff Report and a few complaint sites seems to have lost some visibility in Google’s search results at the start of November.

Our CEO Pierre Zarokian first noticed the change around November 6^th, after he checked different keywords related to his clients. He found only one that was still ranking high on Google search.

On Twitter, as well as on several private forum’s, there was barely any mention of the event at the time. In recent days, others have acknowledged that they have also noticed that something is amiss.

The RipoffReport website is a site where consumers can go to complain about business owners, products, and services. Because the website is listed so high in Google rankings, being listed there can destroy or seriously damage people’s online reputations and businesses. The site has a strict no removal policy, and has even defied court orders which demand the removal of information.

Other complaint sites which have also lost ratings include ScamBook, PissedConsumer, ComplaintsBoard, DirtyScam, and Consumer Affairs.

This has led some industry analysts to conclude that Google has indeed made changes to its algorithm in order to downgrade the ranking of these types of sites.

UPDATE 3/25/2020: Since this article was writen, Nik Richie is no longer the owner of thedirty. However, the site still does not remove content by request.

TheDirty.com which is a website that allows anyone to submit “dirt” on anyone, such as information on cheating exes, has been known not to ever remove posts, even though they offer a removal request page. There are a few exceptions and these have to do with copyright violations. Our company has dealt with several individuals listed on TheDirty who have sent in multiple removal requests which have been denied.

A search of the DMCA copyright violation notices at chillingeffects.org will show that several individuals have unsuccessfully tried to remove content by sending copyright violation notices to Google (and presumably TheDirty), but most of the time, neither Google nor TheDirty have complied. However, there are a few times that TheDirty and Google have removed content, mainly having to do when a photographer or someone with legal standing has requested. So unless there are some copyrighted images that you are the owner of or unless you have some legal representation, you may be out of luck in removing content from The Dirty, but even then the chances are very slim.

We found an individual that has sent in multiple emails for removal, but Nik Richie, the owner of thedirty, has refused to remove them and instead he has posted the full removal email requests, making the matters worst for this individual. In this case both the original poster and the victim have sent in request without any luck. The victim had even offered to pay for the removal, but Nik declined. Below you can see the full postings:

http://thedirty.com/2013/05/san-diegos-sugar-baby-laura-valente-this-is-good-one/
http://thedirty.com/2013/05/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-1/
http://thedirty.com/2013/05/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-2/
http://thedirty.com/2013/05/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-3/
http://thedirty.com/2013/05/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-4/
http://www.thedirty.com/2013/05/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-5/
http://thedirty.com/2013/06/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-6/
http://thedirty.com/2013/06/the-removal-chronicles-of-laura-valente-part-7/

Nik even posted this on top of the first post:
“*Update: Dear World, I’m not removing this post. Please stop asking. It won’t happen.”

There have been numerous lawsuits against TheDirty, but with the exception one case that is still pending, all have been lost due to the CDA law which protects public forums from liability of what others post.

How We can Help?

Reputation Stars offers TheDirty post removal services. If you have negative posts on thedirty that you would like removed, please contact us. We have successfully removed numerous listings from thedirty legally. If you would like to see some references, they could be provided.  We guarantee post removal from thedirty or you do not pay.

Google first launched its Instant Search feature several years ago. At the time, this function would display the results of a search as the user was typing. This kind of real-time search aligned well with Google’s mission to emphasize speed. The company dubbed the feature: “Google Instant”, but it is effectively dead as of this moment. Why did Google pull the plug? Read on to learn more.

Google Instant was first launched in 2010, and it was under the leadership of Marissa Mayer. She intended to create a functional that would be responsive to the user’s query and deliver results faster. It used predictive technology to learn what users wanted, and served results for better or worse.

Today, more than half of all searches are carried out on a mobile device. Instant Search no longer offers the same value to users that it once did, and so Google has discontinued the service entirely. You might recall the considerable media attention it garnered when it first launched.

Google’s new search feature, rather than suggestion websites to visit, will now show users some suggested search queries. User will be able to drill down further with a few extra clicks, but the shift is subtle that most will barely notice it.

For Google, this move will help bring the mobile and desktop experiences closer together. It will also do away with an uncomfortable feature many desktop users had already found ways to disable.

This won’t completely alter the landscape of search, but it will bring back some emphasis on competition for the search page.

Depending on the search term, these changes may help or hurt keywords related to your reputation management project.