'We erase your past': Spanish firm helps clients clean up their online profile

A reputation management company in Spain has been hired by more than 1,400 people to hide their murky pasts online. Eliminalia promises people to erase their pasts from the internet "by using an array of underhanded tactics to stifle criticism of its clients, from intimidating journalists to churning out fake news," according to a report by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) on Friday (February 17).

Eliminalia is based in Barcelona and has been laundering reputations for over ten years. Its clients include dozens of people who have been convicted or suspected of crimes including drug trafficking, money laundering, sexual assault and fraud. The company has emerged as a crucial player in the global disinformation-for-hire industry.

Who is behind Eliminalia?

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According to a report by the Guardian on Friday, Eliminalia was founded in 2013 by Diego “Didac” Sanchez. Over the years, it has built a catalogue of clients from across 50 countries. Sanchez, 30, claims to control a sprawling network of companies including a Ukrainian surrogacy business which is under investigation for trafficking babies.

According to the OCCRP, Sanchez appears to have built its network with a man named Jose Maria Hill Prados, who was convicted of sexually abusing him as a minor. Although Prados’ name does not appear on Eliminalia’s records, Spanish investigators suspect he may control the reputation manager, too.

Leaked files reveal the company's digital influence

Thousands of leaked files obtained by French non-profit Forbidden Stories gave insights into Eliminalia's extensive web of digital influence. According to the records, Eliminalia used copyright and privacy laws to intimidate journalists, manipulate search engines to hide information and churn out fake news. In some countries, the Spanish reputation management company opened new business ventures with its criminal clients.

Citing experts, OCCRP reported that Eliminalia has been a part of a growing disinformation industry that helps bad actors, from criminals to kleptocrats, to hide their murky pasts. Tena Prelec, a research fellow at Oxford University who studies transnational kleptocracy, said, "This whole mechanism, this commission of money and reputation laundering, this everyday kleptocracy, depends today on transnational professional intermediaries."

“You have a whole series of professional service industries, such as public relations agents, lobbyists, lawyers … who basically help in this retasking of unsavoury individuals and companies and governments as internationally respected businesspeople and philanthropic cosmopolitans,” Prelec added.

Who are the clients?

The leaked files show that over 1,400 clients have used Eliminalia to clean up their reputations. These include hundreds of people who have been convicted or suspected of the earlier-mentioned crimes. The clients also include some ordinary people seeking to erase malicious material posted about them online.

Here are some of the company's criminal clients

> Area S.p.A. -an Italian company- paid Eliminalia $107,215 (100,000 Euros) to remove 72 news reports that it was fined in the United States for illegally providing equipment to Syria’s sanctioned government. Speaking to the OCCRP, Area said it hired the Spanish company to remove content through legal means only because it was often incorrect and unfairly presumed the company’s (Area's) guilt.

> Malchas Tetruashvili, a money launderer for Russian-Georgian mafia boss Tariel Oniani, paid $32,164 (30,000 euros) to get rid of 79 links to unfavourable content about him after a Spanish court sentenced him to five months in prison.

> José Mestre Fernandez, who was sentenced for heading a cocaine trafficking network in Barcelona, was a client of Eliminalia from 2016-2020.

The list also includes a former political candidate Miguel Ángel Colorado Cessa- who was accused of laundering money for the notorious Los Zetas Cartel in Mexico. He paid Eliminalia $9,000 to remove news reports linking him and his brother Francisco Antonio Colorado Cessa (who died in 2018) to the Los Zetas.

Another such client was Gabriel Westmann, who was accused by Argentina authorities in 2017 of having laundered money for the Sinaloa drug cartel, another notorious drug cartel in Mexico. However, the charges were dismissed two years later due to insufficient evidence.

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