Social networking giant Facebook has been slammed by tech press overnight after it was reported the company hired a PR firm to conduct a smear campaign against rival Silicon Valley giant Google without identifying itself.
But while PR firm Burson-Marsteller has now confirmed it was hired by Facebook to start the campaign, it now argues that bringing stories to journalists via this method was not “standard operating procedure”.
“When talking to the media, we need to adhere to strict standards of transparency about clients, and this incident underscores the absolute importance of that principle,” it said in a statement.
The story began when Burson-Marsteller started pitching stories to media outlets about how Google is dealing with users’ private data, suggesting it was “scraping” data from users’ Facebook profiles and other sources. It spoke to a number of different outlets, including some of the biggest tech publications in the United States.
Among some of its claims were that “the American people must be made aware of the now immediate intrusions into their deeply personal lives Google is cataloguing and broadcasting every minute of every day – without their permission”.
The basis of this attack was the introduction of something Google calls the Social Circle – which allows users to see information about other users with whom they have “secondary connections”.
But the plan backfired when the company spoke with a blogger, Chris Soghoian, who argued the stories being pitched weren’t news-worthy and published a series of emails between himself and a Burson representative.
Then, USA Today published a story regarding the claims, essentially arguing they were overblown. After which, the Daily Beast published a report claiming Facebook was behind the entire campaign – but that Burson-Marsteller only admitted this after Facebook identified itself as the client.
In a statement, the social network told the Daily Beast that it is concerned about the way Google is “scraping” information from profiles through its search engine.
But Facebook also said it should have presented the information in a “serious and transparent way”.
“No ‘smear’ campaign was authorised or intended. Instead, we wanted third parties to verify that people did not approve of the collection and use of information from their accounts on Facebook and other services for inclusion in Google Social Circles – just as Facebook did not approve of use or collection for this purpose.”
“We engaged Burson-Marsteller to focus attention on this issue, using publicly available information that could be independently verified by any media organisation or analyst. The issues are serious and we should have presented them in a serious and transparent way.”
Facebook was contacted for comment this morning but no reply was received before publication.
The battle represents one of the biggest fights in the modern digital age, regarding the ability to hold on to users’ data and use it for purposes without their knowledge.
The attempted smear campaign also comes as Facebook is challenging Google for advertising dollars – reports indicate it is heading towards $US2 billion in advertising revenue a year – and it is likely that as its power grows, skirmishes like this could become more commonplace.
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
