Eliminalia, rebranded as 'Idata Protection' in January 2023 is a Spanish company which has specialized in

reputation management Reputation management, refers to the Social influence, influencing, controlling, enhancing, or concealing of an individual's or group's reputation. It is a marketing technique used to modify a person's or a company's reputation in a positive way. ...

. It was founded in 2011 by Diego Sánchez, known as Dídac Sánchez. The technical offices are in

Kyiv, Ukraine Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...

. Eliminalia is the property of Maidan Holdings, a Miami-based holding company. In 2015, Eliminalia offered its services without charge to anyone affected by the

Ashley Madison data breach In July 2015, an unknown person or group calling itself "The Impact Team" announced that they had stolen user data of Ashley Madison, a commercial website billed as enabling extramarital affairs. The hackers copied personal information about the ...

. In 2020, Eliminalia received several

vanity awards Vanity is the excessive belief in one's own abilities or attractiveness compared to others. Prior to the 14th century, it did not have such narcissistic undertones, and merely meant ''futility''. The related term vainglory is now often seen as a ...

: ''Technology Innovator Awards 2020'' by AI Global Media and ''Cyber Security Company of the Year'' by Corporate LiveWire. In 2021, , an

NGO A non-governmental organization (NGO) is an independent, typically nonprofit organization that operates outside government control, though it may get a significant percentage of its funding from government or corporate sources. NGOs often focus ...

dedicated to the defense of digital rights, accused Eliminalia of creating a network of fake websites with back-dated articles and then spamming them with apparently legal

DMCA The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is a 1998 United States copyright law that implements two 1996 treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or ...

takedown notices and

GDPR The General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679), abbreviated GDPR, is a European Union regulation on information privacy in the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA). The GDPR is an important component of ...

complaints. These were intended to take down articles referring to corruption in

Angola Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the west-Central Africa, central coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking world, Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) country in both total area and List of c ...

regarding

Isabel dos Santos Isabel Kukanova dos Santos (; born 20 April 1973) is an Angolan businesswoman, the eldest child of Angola's former President José Eduardo dos Santos, who ruled the country from 1979 to 2017. As early as 2013 ''Forbes'' described how dos Santo ...

and Vincent Miclet.

Internal documents leak

In 2023, after a

news leak A news leak is the unsanctioned release of confidential information to news media. It can also be the premature publication of information by a news outlet, of information that it has agreed not to release before a specified time, in violation of a ...

of approximately 50,000 internal documents to French nonprofit

Forbidden Stories Forbidden Stories is a Nonprofit organization, non-profit organization with the mission "to continue and publish the work of other journalists facing threats, prison, or murder." To achieve this, it allows journalists to send their work to Forbid ...

, the company was accused of using '

blackhat A black hat (black hat hacker or blackhat) is a computer hacker who violates laws or ethical standards for nefarious purposes, such as cybercrime, cyberwarfare, or malice. These acts can range from piracy to identity theft. A black hat is often r ...

tactics' to help clients in 50 countries, including torturers, convicted criminals, corrupt politicians, scammers and spyware companies to erase their past from the internet. Eliminalia allegedly uses an array of underhanded tactics to stifle criticism of its clients, from intimidating journalists to churning out

fake news Fake news or information disorder is false or misleading information (misinformation, disinformation, propaganda, and hoaxes) claiming the aesthetics and legitimacy of news. Fake news often has the aim of damaging the reputation of a person ...

on websites such as ''Taiwan Times'', ''Mayday Washington'', ''CNN News Today'', and ''London Uncensored'' - all of which are connected to Maidan Holdings (Eliminalia's parent company). Using falsified

copyright infringement Copyright infringement (at times referred to as piracy) is the use of Copyright#Scope, works protected by copyright without permission for a usage where such permission is required, thereby infringing certain exclusive rights granted to the c ...

notices, the company manipulates "

right to be forgotten The right to be forgotten (RTBF) is the right to have private information about a person be removed from Internet searches and other directories in some circumstances. The issue has arisen from desires of individuals to "determine the developmen ...

" laws, designed to protect people from malicious material online, by sending emails that appear to be from the European Commission to journalists and publishers of the unwanted articles. Two clients of Eliminalia are convicted drug traffickers; other clients included Venezuela officials, Malchas Tetruashvili (convicted of

money laundering Money laundering is the process of illegally concealing the origin of money obtained from illicit activities (often known as dirty money) such as drug trafficking, sex work, terrorism, corruption, and embezzlement, and converting the funds i ...

for Georgian mafia boss

Tariel Oniani Tariel Oniani ( ka, ტარიელ ონიანი; born 1952) is a Georgian mafia boss and 'thief in law'. He is reportedly a member of the "Kutaisi" criminal gang. Background and activity in Spain Born in the mining town of Tkibuli in ...

in 2019), José Mestré (convicted of cocaine trafficking in 2010), former bank officials at

Banca Privada d'Andorra Banca Privada d'Andorra (, BPA) was a bank in Andorra founded in 1957. History Banca Privada d'Andorra was created in 1957 under the name of Banca Cassany and began its activities in 1958. In 1993 Caixa Catalunya became a shareholder and the e ...

, as well as 'scammers, spyware companies, torturers, convicted criminals, corrupt politicians and others in the global underworld'. One has been charged with laundering money for a prostitution ring. Another sold U.S. equipment to the Syrian government. Three more are indicted for helping carry out a cryptocurrency scam that stole billions of dollars from investors. As of January 2023, it appears that Eliminalia has rebranded as 'Idata Protection'.

References

{{reflist Companies of Spain 2011 establishments in Spain Reputation management companies