An underground business, that charges companies high fees to delete negative news or posts against them, has been flourishing in the run-up to World Consumer Rights Day today, normally regarded as the most important day to highlight a company's good reputation.
Such business operators describe themselves as "public relation experts for dealing with crises" and release their mobile phone numbers or contact details through online instant messaging programs such as QQ on the Internet.
Although there is no data available on the number of operators, a Baidu search in Chinese of "professional post-deleting company in Beijing" revealed a total of 679,000 pages.
Insiders told METRO they work like agents for companies or individuals worried about online scandals or negative reports and persuade portals reproducing or forwarding such information to delete it.
An operator surnamed Wu with Han De Kai Si Crisis Dealing Experts Company, told METRO on Sunday they normally charge 600 to 800 yuan per post deleted.
He revealed there were usually two ways to deal with such business crises, including paying insiders within websites to delete online information and hiring people to release positive posts with the same titles as negative posts.
"So, when civilians search the names or brands of businesses, they will find them enjoying good reputations on many web pages," he said.
Wu said, if created by his company, such positive posts cost 300 yuan per 1,000 Chinese characters and 150 yuan for one post released in an eye-catching position on a website.
Deleting was harder than releasing, he said, because it was risky for the insiders who might lose their jobs if discovered.
"It would not be worthwhile for several hundred yuan to take a big risk," he said.
A marketing director surnamed Ai, with a company that did not wish to be identified, revealed more.
She said the company's most expensive deletion reached 10,000 yuan for one post deleted from the prestigious portal sina.com, as the World Consumer Rights Day approached.
"Thanks to March 15. We earned more," she said and revealed her company enjoyed an annual income of nearly 6 million yuan last year.
However, she confirmed that deletion was becoming increasingly difficult as more and more people joined the underground business.
"Portals are stricter than ever about online information deletion and some even require each deleted post to be marked showing who deleted it," she said. But with the crisis management companies charging such high fees some companies have opted to do it themselves.
Wang Yue, a 42-year-old public relation manager, said she had got used to dealing with such "online troubles".
"We have employees to check online information related to our company each day. We normally don't pay too much for deletion as the small greedy websites may reproduce the information and request more," she said.
