User:Noleander/sandbox

Some PR firms perform reputation laundering services. In these situations, a client will hire a PR firm to conceal unethical, corrupt, or criminal behavior or other forms of controversies. The PR firm will supply services that improve the client's reputation and obscure the client's history, such as: arranging publication of positive press, coordinating donations to charities, arranging sponsorships and advertising (such as of sports teams), arranging attendance at major social events, and recommending prominent associations that the client can join. Other mechanisms employed by PR firms on behalf of the purportedly corrupt or criminal customers include fake social media accounts, blogs by fake personalities, or partisan op-eds.

Notable PR firms that have engaged in reputation laundering include British PR firm Bell Pottinger, which employed reputation laundering in support of clients such as Alexander Lukashenko, Bahrain, and the Pinochet Foundation. PR firms Havas, Publicis, and Qorvis were hired by Saudi Arabia to perform reputation laundering after 9/11 and the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi. The United Kingdom government generated a report in 2020, stating that Russian oligarchs had been "extending patronage and building influence across a wide sphere of the British establishment" and had employed public relations firms that were "willing beneficiaries, contributing to a ‘reputation laundering' process".