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Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Bell Pottinger COI Investigations

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It emerged in early December 2011 that accounts operated by Bell Pottinger, a British PR firm, had been extensively editing Wikipedia to further their clients' interests. This page attempts to identify and remove these edits.

So far, eleven accounts are confirmed to have been operated by the firm, and several more cannot be confirmed but have suspicious editing records. The list is probably not complete - please let us know on the discussion page if you have found others.

The affected articles are listed below, grouped into clusters by topic. It should not be considered a list of clients, and there may be false positives.

Article list

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The articles below are the complete contributions to articles by the confirmed Bell Pottinger accounts: Biggleswiki (talk · contribs) ; Charlesstewart99 (talk · contribs) ; Diginerd84 (talk · contribs) ; Pipsster (talk · contribs) ; Smythej (talk · contribs) ; GBSewnli (talk · contribs); Ejbsnow (talk · contribs) ; Techboy1900 (talk · contribs) ; Illyhawaii (talk · contribs) ; Awb44 (talk · contribs) ; Slaine1 (talk · contribs) ; and 109.231.203.194 (talk · contribs). Other edits are not currently included.

The list does not show deleted edits, or edits to discussion pages, etc. Check individual user contributions for those.

Sorted

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Paramount Group

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All dealt with
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Abiraterone / Prostate Centre

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All dealt with
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Individual people (and articles connected to them)

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Individual organizations and products

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Uncontentious changes

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All dealt with
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
tagging, cleanup, etc. - normal editorial work.

Unsorted

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(109.231.203.194 made 1 edits, 0 major, +2) (+2)  Done Article rolled back to pre-BP state by User:Gobonobo. Rich Farmbrough, 14:49, 11 December 2011 (UTC).[reply]


Possible but unconfirmed articles

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These pages may or may not have been edited by Bell Pottinger operated accounts.

List of accounts

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Bell Pottinger

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Chime Communications (Bell Pottinger parent company)

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Unrelated

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Technically unrelated to the above, but with a South African connection. Needs an experienced CU to check.

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I've indef'd all these accounts (and a few others I stumbled across during the cleanup process), with the exception of Martinj1973. Regardless of whether or not they belong to Bell Pottinger, they're all spammers and several of them are very obviously the same person. I left Martinj1973 because I can't be sure there—that account doesn't display the traits that some of the others have. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:20, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Southwiki and Drake ice are  Confirmed as each other, and I have very good reason to believe that they are spammers. I also have good reason to believe that Drake (talk · contribs) is related, and I've indeffed them. PetersBah is Red X Unrelated and most of the technical data is  Stale, but I endorse the block. WilliamH (talk) 07:53, 9 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]