Between socializing with royals and world leaders and abusing children and young women, Jeffrey Epstein is regularly seen Googling himself. In several batches of documents relating to the convicted sex offender made public, we see Epstein sending emails to associates complaining that his digital footprint contained factual information about his crimes.
I want the Google page to be cleared (November 5, 2010)
Mike “Can you open my wiki page?” (April 18, 2011)
Any way to clean up my wiki page? (September 17, 2013)
Epstein regularly turns his attention to Al Seckel, a sort of fixer who appears repeatedly in the Epstein files and promises to bury news articles and other material that mention his abuses. But Seckel didn’t do it alone. From thousands of documents, it’s clear that many people — SEO consultants, contacts in science, and even unrelated acquaintances — helped obscure Epstein’s past whenever someone searched for him online. Even after Epstein pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution and making him a registered sex offender, his network was still happy to dote on him and reputation management firms took him on as clients. Reputation management services are not necessarily a tool to cover up crimes – that’s a standard public relations practice – but in Epstein’s case, the agencies would have been aware of his misconduct, given that they were hired to try to minimize it.
In October 2010, Seckel presented an overview of the group’s plan of online attack to protect Epstein’s reputation. The situation, as Seckel explained, was that a search turned up “over 75+ pages of offensive material”, and one would be “very hard to find any ‘positive’ references.” “To balance the one-sided negative opinion widespread on the Internet, the team will have to fill the field with content they can control,” Seckel said, pointing specifically to the creation of websites with original content related to science and Epstein’s relationship with charity. Seckel will be the unpaid “team leader” along with other unpaid consultants. $25,000 will be paid to a contractor who will spread lucrative links on the web. An unnamed group of “hackers” will be paid $2,500 to leave positive comments on Epstein-related news articles. The VergeMessages left to Michael Kesselring, who works in SEO out of West Hollywood, went unanswered.
During this time frame, Epstein and his team discussed editing his Wikipedia page to remove mentions of him being a sex offender and pedophile, replacing his mugshot with other pictures, and removing news articles he did not like. Recently released files include several wire transfers to Kiesling, totaling $22,500. Elsewhere, Kesselring also mentions getting “over [$20,000] In cash” without any receipt from Sekel.
By 2013, Epstein was in the market for another “good reversal”. [SEO] individual,” as he wrote in an email, and someone named Tyler Shears was recommended. Within a few weeks, Shears was creating a 30-day plan — quoting $125 an hour — and starting with a different strategy like strengthening the material around Jeffrey Epstein “to help deflect some of the negative consequences for our Epsteins.” By February 2014, Epstein’s accountant noted that Shears Epstein was “unsure what has changed” since he hired Shears. The person with the same name and company did not respond. The VergeRequest for comment.
Epstein also shopped around for reputation management firms and was turned down multiple times, according to the emails. In 2010, Seckel forwarded to Epstein one of his exchanges with a company called Infuse Creative.
Gregory Markel, the firm’s founder, wrote to Seckel, “We have no problem helping someone who is innocent of the allegations or is a true victim of the circumstances, but if there is truth in these allegations and convictions, I am afraid we will have to go through this.” “Do you personally know how many of these allegations are true?”
Elsewhere, an associate whose name is redacted in the files told Epstein that Reputation.com could not represent him “because” [his] Background” but another firm, Integrity Defenders, (the files also include a paid invoice from Integrity Defenders for $2,449).
“Please tell them or anyone else not to click on any negative links again as this may cause them to remain on the first page,” an account manager at the firm wrote in an email. The website for Integrity Defenders is inactive and The Verge The company could not be contacted.
“What wonderful ideas!”
When it came to attempting to hide Epstein’s crimes online, many people – paid and unpaid, knowingly or unknowingly – aided in whitewashing. In 2010, when Seckel and his team launched websites focused on Epstein’s ties to science and his philanthropy in an effort to deflect media coverage, Fixer began emailing acquaintances, asking for help. The request was simple: Would they link to Epstein’s sites on their websites? Seckel asked scientists associated with UCLA, several physicists, and others in the scientific community. The idea, at least from an SEO perspective, is that getting valuable links from trustworthy sources like academic institutions will signal to Google that Epstein’s new sites should come up to anyone searching for him. Part of how Google decides which pages to rank higher in search results is to look at whether other sites link to a page; It appears that Epstein’s camp is trying to reduce negative search results by acquiring valuable links from outside organizations.
One of the acquaintances who agreed to add links back to Epstein’s sites is Mark Tramo, an assistant professor in the department of neurology at UCLA who told sfgate That he “didn’t hear anything.” [about] Despite statutory rape or minors being involved, I never saw him with young girls, never visited the island, never flew on his planes. But in 2010, Tramo was eager to grant Sekel’s request for the link.
“What wonderful ideas!” He responded before describing the “support” (including anonymously) provided by Epstein for his work.
“The links are growing all over the world and at major institutions,” Seckel wrote to Epstein in another thread. Even after Epstein pleaded guilty to procuring a girl under the age of 18 for prostitution, the industry he had entered was happy to continue the ruse.
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