"How an accused Bay Area fraudster may have gamed Google to hide Chronicle story"

SF Chronicle:

When a news article exposed the criminal past of a former insurance claims investigator at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland — who’s now accused by federal prosecutors of embezzling $7 million from the company — it created a digital record available to the world.

Potential employers, industry colleagues, friends, relatives or anyone else who ran [the investigator]’s name in Google would find the 2016 Chronicle story at the top of the search list.

So it appears that [the investigator] — or someone looking to help him — did what many others have done when faced with a negative internet search result: Bury it.

...

First, create accounts on Tumblr, Crunchbase, WordPress, Twitter, LinkedIn and dozens of other pages. Then, begin populating each site with content. Last comes the tricky part.

To boost search engine optimization, a person must crowdsource digital clicks from a variety of sources, mimicking interest in the content.