User:Smallbones/draft1
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Portland Communications
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikiproject:Antispam/Qatar_tracker
Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Bennet43/Archive
https://www.prweek.co.uk/article/1945255/portland-wikilaundering-claims-prompt-cipr-criticism PR Week
For In the media https://www.ft.com/content/513761bb-3b6c-4b32-9931-a34f01047558 https://z100.iheart.com/featured/elvis-duran/content/2026-01-13-1014-elvis-duran-and-the-morni-the-backstory-the-night-wikipedia-almost-van/
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Who writes Wikipedia? Wealthy whitewashers!
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"No one said, 'We should stop doing this.' The question was how we could keep doing it without getting caught."
-Unnamed former Portland Communications employee quoted in The Bureau of Investigative Journalism
Tom considered, was about to consent ; but he altered his mind : "No — no — I reckon it wouldn't hardly do, Ben. You see, Aunt Polly's awful particular about this fence — right here on the street, you know — but if it was the back fence I wouldn't mind and she wouldn't. Yes, she's awful particular about this fence; it's got to be done very careful; I reckon there ain't one boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand, that can do it the way it's got to be done.
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) is one of the leading groups of journalists to investigate paid editing on Wikipedia. In 2011 they were the first to report on the infamous PR firm Bell Pottinger who promised that they could perform “dark arts” on Wikipedia on undercover video
Also in 2011 TBIJ exposed one of Wikipedia’s worst paid editors, the London lobbying and PR firm Portland Communications (PC). This month (January 14) TBIJ did it again. Despite being caught earlier, PC had kept on doing “Wiki-laundering” as TBIJ calls it. The term Wiki-laundering might include adding biased material to a client’s article, but certainly includes “whitewashing” the removal of cited material. This article will concentrate on whitewashing.
PC focused on was the removal of the word wifebeater, used as a nickname, from the article about the Belgian beer Stella Artois as well as removing Stella Artois from the disambiguation page Wifebeater. An unregistered editor 83.244.252.242 also edited Wifebeater, Stella Artois, as well as PC clients BTA Bank from Kazakhstan, and its former head Mukhtar Ablyazov. The edits to the article on Ablyazov included whitewashing e.g. here and here.
User:Portlander10, who had only 14 edits (including 7 to his user page), created the Portland Communications page in a fairly positive but otherwise normal tone. Their other edits added links to PC for the company’s founder and another exec, and to the Wife beater disambiguation page, where they removed Stella Artois from the page.
Recent disclosures
TBIJ targeted Qatari corruption during the 2010 bidding process for the 2022 FIFA World Cup. The article shows how they hacked the email accounts of journalists and government officials.
The 2026 articles include Qatar and related articles which were allegedly whitewashed in preparation for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, and the Libyan Sovereign Investment Fund, as well as the more palatable
Green Africa and its main funder The Bill Gates Foundation.
PC did not make all these edits. Rather they subcontracted the editing to a firm known as Web3 Consulting - now dissolved - run by an SEO operator Radek Kotlarek. This arrangement seemed to answer the question posed by a former PC employee quoted by TBIJ, “The question was how we could keep doing it without getting caught.” TBIJ reports that seven former PC employees said that PC partners had used Kotlarek’s services for about a decade.
TBIJ found other subtle changes, such as relegating unwelcome information about clients under descriptions of their philanthropic work, or swapping out critical news references to articles with something more positive.
The Guardian, Prominent PR firm accused of commissioning favourable changes to Wikipedia pages January 16, 2026