I’m not a big Michael Jackson fan, though I must admit that my brother and I did make countless (failed) attempts to moonwalk when we were young. That said, I was still hit with a wave of sadness when I heard that the King of Pop was no longer with us. What made it worse was the fact that instead of focusing solely on his brilliant chart-topping singles, thrilling dance moves and forward fashion, news which hit the headlines were instead that of Michael Jackson-related spam.

As part of my internship at Rice Comms, I track industry news concerning our client BoxSentry which deals with email security. During my morning trawls of news articles, numerous stories which traced how hackers used Michael Jackson’s death to try and trick people into disclosing personal details came up. Less than 24 hours after the death of the megastar, reports emerged that grieving fans received emails claiming to contain ‘vital information’ about his death. Although the messages didn’t contain any malicious attachments or links to infected websites, if the recipient replies, spammers can harvest their email address for potential use in ID fraud. Unfortunately other spammers are more dangerous, spamming out malicious links claiming to include exclusive footage of Jackson’s last moments, or disguising themselves as breaking news.

All this, of course, points to the importance of having an effective and credible email security system. But something else this incident reminded me of was the power of the internet and the tremendous impact it has.

Being in the PR industry (or hoping to be part of it post-graduation), the internet can no longer be dismissed as a frivolous tool only good for social networking (and even that has been proven to be a myth). The internet is now an integral part of communications with a company’s stakeholders. While in this case, obviously no one blames Jackson or his family for originating the viruses, companies may not be so lucky and find themselves in a position where hackers assume their identity to infect computers.

As PR practitioners, this is definitely an area that we definitely need to watch out for as we manage our company’s reputation and serve our clients well. Getting hit by attacks from spammers are inevitable, and the chances of attacks occurring increases as companies get more successful. However the job of PR practitioners is to ensure that even after attacks, the company is remembered for its strengths. Upholding our clients’ reputations at the end of the day is crucial, and we must constantly be on guard against such issues occurring and have strategies on hand to tackle any unfortunate incidents.