Mugshot Removal?

[Walter Black]

Hey fellow BBHF members..

So I know this is a very random question lol, but I have a potential reputation management client that has a few mugshots on the Internet that they want to get removed.

I've read a few articles on the topic, but I haven't found a solution yet..

And I was wondering if any SEO experts out there could give me some good advice on how I should proceed with this process..

Personally, I have no idea how to get the mugshots removed the Internet..

The only solutions I can think of is to reach out to the website owners and ask politely for the links to be removed due to a privacy issue..

Or by manipulating the CTR's to get good links on the first page instead of the bad ones.. but more than likely, the links would still be visible..

Any advice guys?

[Malice]

I have looked into this recently, mostly out of curiosity and the entire subject behind online mugshot websites is very interesting.

Apparently, convicted or not, mugshots are considered public domain. So those sites do not have to take remove them for any legal reasons...usually. Though some states are trying to pass bills to change the way this system works, and limiting the site owners ability to profit from the mugshots.

Most of these large mugshot database websites will remove the Mugshot, for a price...and sometimes providing proof that the case, in relation to the hosted mugshot, has been legally dismissed. However, paying one website to remove your mugshot does not garauntee all the hundreds of other mugshots DB websites will do. This has been compared to a game of whack-a-mole. You get the mugshot removed from one website, and 9 other websites start displaying the mugshot, hoping to get paid for removal services.

Now there are companies who offer mugshot removal services, where they go and find all of the sites hosting your mugshot and try to get them removed. This service is normally very expensive.

Luckily, this caught a decent amount of media attention a year or 2 ago and Google took steps to hinder the mugshot business. What Google did was derank their websites, so when you search for "John B. Doe" who was arrested in 1985 and has a mugshot on those websites, the mugshot sites won't show up on the first page, and usually not on the first few pages.

Outside of that, I don't really see much option as far as SEO goes. I guess you can try Google Bombing them, but given the insane amount of traffic those mugshot sites get I doubt that would be very effective. Hope some of this helps.

[Walt The Heavyweight]

edit: changed mind. delete.

[Malice]

...that's not really a method...that's just common sense for even a novice SEO. But if you can sell it, more power to you.

[Walter Black]

I was aware of most of this information.. I just didn't know if there was some sort of strategy that you guys might know to solve the problem besides paying a mugshot database website or a mugshot removal service..

I guess I could try bumping the results off the first page by creating some accounts with sites that have a stronger domain authority than the mugshot database sites. Then send a vast amount of clicks to those high DA sites and see what that does..

Thanks for your feedback tho, +5 reps

(06-30-2015 04:59 AM)Malice Wrote:  I have looked into this recently, mostly out of curiosity and the entire subject behind online mugshot websites is very interesting.

Apparently, convicted or not, mugshots are considered public domain. So those sites do not have to take remove them for any legal reasons...usually. Though some states are trying to pass bills to change the way this system works, and limiting the site owners ability to profit from the mugshots.

Most of these large mugshot database websites will remove the Mugshot, for a price...and sometimes providing proof that the case, in relation to the hosted mugshot, has been legally dismissed. However, paying one website to remove your mugshot does not garauntee all the hundreds of other mugshots DB websites will do. This has been compared to a game of whack-a-mole. You get the mugshot removed from one website, and 9 other websites start displaying the mugshot, hoping to get paid for removal services.

Now there are companies who offer mugshot removal services, where they go and find all of the sites hosting your mugshot and try to get them removed. This service is normally very expensive.

Luckily, this caught a decent amount of media attention a year or 2 ago and Google took steps to hinder the mugshot business. What Google did was derank their websites, so when you search for "John B. Doe" who was arrested in 1985 and has a mugshot on those websites, the mugshot sites won't show up on the first page, and usually not on the first few pages.

Outside of that, I don't really see much option as far as SEO goes. I guess you can try Google Bombing them, but given the insane amount of traffic those mugshot sites get I doubt that would be very effective. Hope some of this helps.

[Malice]

The mugshot sites are showing up on page 1? That's very strange. If your goal is only to get them off page one it's a matter of outranking the mugshot site. Seeing that Google took action against those types of websites to de-rank them it should be extremely easy to do, just make a few websites, blogs, facebook fanpage, etc and rank them for your clients name.

[Walter Black]

(06-30-2015 06:21 AM)Malice Wrote:  The mugshot sites are showing up on page 1? That's very strange. If your goal is only to get them off page one it's a matter of outranking the mugshot site. Seeing that Google took action against those types of websites to de-rank them it should be extremely easy to do, just make a few websites, blogs, facebook fanpage, etc and rank them for your clients name.

Yeah, there's only one mugshot site that really stands out on the first page. When you search the client's name, there's two mugshot images that appear when you click on the Google images tab.

In total, there's only seven mugshot sites that show up in the Google algorithm. So it shouldn't be too difficult to get them off the first page.

Do you have any good recommendations on rich media sites that could help me outrank those images in the Googe images tabs? Ex: LinkedIn, Youtube, etc?

[Malice]

I would use a little bit of everything. Social sites are easy peasy. YouTube, Facebook, Google+, Twitter. Some Wordpress Blogs, easy to set up and control. Heck, grab as much of these as you can and set them up under the clients name.

Code:

https://namechk.com/

. Rank a bunch of images with their name as your keyword, see if you can't push their mugshot off the google image results. etc. Just about anything should outrank those mugshot sites pretty quickly and easily.

[Walter Black]

(06-30-2015 06:36 AM)Malice Wrote:  I would use a little bit of everything. Social sites are easy peasy. YouTube, Facebook, Google+, Twitter. Some Wordpress Blogs, easy to set up and control. Heck, grab as much of these as you can and set them up under the clients name.

Code:

https://namechk.com/

. Rank a bunch of images with their name as your keyword, see if you can't push their mugshot off the google image results. etc. Just about anything should outrank those mugshot sites pretty quickly and easily.

Thanks for this advice, it's much appreciated

[stockbob55]

Good advice
Its pretty easy to rank a whole host of web 2.0 sites on the 1st page
especially if you do your on page seo.
youtube
blogger
wp
google+
etc
Use GSA or Fiverr for PA.
Usually the particular mugshot page is not optimized too well.
They tend to rank on authority.

I did this for a friend a while back, pushed them onto page 2.
also
If there are only 1 or 2 sites involved
you could send them a friendly batch of 300-500k porno links.
I didn't, but you could.

Regards
Bob