Reputation Defenders = Removers of Fraudulent Credentials

So today I receive an email from a company called "Reputation Defenders", which should probably, based on the email from them, be more accurately referred to as "fraudulent credential erasers"

The email is asking us to remove a posting (from 2001) from our archive (which, for the record, we don't do.)

The thread in question is discussing the Prestigious Unaccredited Universities group, one of the largest diploma mill frauds out there. These people are not an unwonderful school offering degrees where you do a little bit of work and then are awarded a degree, so there's not even a remote chance that someone purchasing a degree from them thinks that somehow reading a 200 page book and writing a 2 page paper qualifies them for a doctorate. No, with this place, you pays your money and you gets your degree. They even admit, in the phonecall, that they are a diploma mill.

Here's the question:

The individual in question bought 3 degrees from Palmers Green (totally fraudulent school, doesn't exist anywhere), and the degrees in question are backdated (1989, 1992 and 1998). One of them is a law degree. Said degrees were mentioned in the individual's biography on the site of a law firm, where the person was employed as a paralegal.

Reputation Defender is asking us to remove the link, because apparently it is "harming the client's professional reputation." And indeed, said person's current online profiles on various sites do not mention said fraudulent degrees.

I am at least somewhat of the opinion that the act of knowingly purchasing fake degrees, complete with backdating, and particularly claiming a fake *professional* degree, and advertising said degree on a website shows something about that person's character.

Obviously I have not yet mentioned the person's name. The question is, should someone be able to purchase 3 fake degrees, backdate them so they look legitimate, advertise them on a website (and presumably represent them as legit to their employers), and then, realizing that committing fraud is a bad idea, be able to erase all online references to said degrees?

I've already told Reputation Defenders no, but I am debating whether to repost the page where this individual listed her bio, complete with fake degrees, since I don't know if Reputation Defender is doing the public a service by trying to erase incidences of education fraud from people's online reputations.

Comments appreciated.

 

Interesting update.

Reputation Defenders responded, and even though I gave a very clear indication that the individual bought a completely fraudulent degree, and knowingly did so because of the backdating, their response was simply

"Thank you for your quick reply and consideration. I appreciate you looking over the matter and respect your decision to leave the reference posted. Have a great weekend."

In a few interviews I've seen, the company claims to not accept clients who are not telling the truth, but this appears not to be the case.

Interestingly, there are articles here and here
indicating that the company does not, as it represents, seek to ensure that truthful information is told, but to ensure that any bad publicity is removed.

 

My advice to the individual would be to post a contrite apology explaining the situation to the web. Many, many individuals have side-stepped even plagiarism and misleading actions by explaining what happened and how it cannot happen again.

 

Interestingly, Dave, I got an identical response from a friend of mine I was discussing it with. I may contact the individual in question and suggest that s/he do just that