Facebook bid to smear rival Google backfires

In a twist seemingly out of a Hollywood thriller, Facebook hired a prominent public relations firm to try to plant stories harshly criticizing Google's privacy practices in leading news outlets.

But the efforts backfired when the firm approached a blogger who not only declined the assignment, but also exposed it.

Rather than getting stories about Google’s privacy policy, Facebook found itself having to answer questions about why it wanted to keep its plan secret.

Facebook claimed it never authorised or intended to run any smear campaign against Google.

The company said it hired Burson-Marsteller to prompt investigations into how a new Google service called Social Circle collects and uses data about people. In a statement, Facebook said it should have made it clear that it was behind the efforts.

Burson-Marsteller said Facebook had requested that its identity remain secret “on the grounds that it was merely asking to bring publicly available information to light”.

Ironically, Facebook has had to admit that efforts to stay anonymous violate the terms of service for users of its own site and that “the assignment on those terms should have been declined”.

Facebook acknowledged that it could have handled the matter better but Google, its bitter rival for targeted online advertising, decided to keep its thoughts on the matter private.