Fugitive Kazakh officials Mukhtar Ablyazov and Viktor Khrapunov are exploiting loopholes in American copyright law to remove inconvenient materials from Google search results. To achieve these goals, they have hired a contractor who previously worked with the inner circle of Nursultan Nazarbayev and helped conceal compromising information about the former president's family.
According to the Telegram channel "Access to the Sea", an analysis of the Lumen archive (a platform that records requests for content removal on grounds related to copyright and privacy rights) allows us to trace how campaigns to clean up search results have been conducted in recent years.
Journalists have previously written about how the family of Nursultan Nazarbayev, using loopholes in the DMCA law and fake websites, manages to get critical materials removed from Google, including investigations by foreign media and the US Department of Justice website. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are spent on these reputation-cleansing campaigns abroad, with the youngest daughter, Aliya Nazarbayeva, being particularly active.
The Lumen database records nearly 300 requests related to publications where Ablyazov and Khrapunov are mentioned in the context of criminal cases, money laundering, and financial fraud. Most of these materials were published in Russian-language and English-language media. The removal strategy is simple: temporary websites are created, on which copies of real journalistic materials are published belatedly. A complaint is then filed with Google, alleging that the original article infringes the copyright of this "original source" posted on the fake site. In some cases, such complaints lead to authentic articles losing their positions in search results or disappearing from them entirely.
One of the most active users appearing in the Lumen archive is a certain "Nona Boidalo". Over three thousand requests for content removal have been submitted in their name, the vast majority concerning the Nazarbayev family. The same scheme was also used against publications about Khrapunov and Ablyazov. For example, "Nona Boidalo" sent complaints about an article in the Financial Times, which discussed a possible link between Viktor Khrapunov and money laundering, as well as his appearance in matters involving Donald Trump. By filing a false complaint, the content author succeeded in removing the article from the first pages of searches.
Interestingly, companies providing such services work not only with Kazakh individuals. It is noted that they also collaborate with representatives of the Russian elite. In particular, among their clients are mentioned the press secretary of the Russian President, Dmitry Peskov, the head of the Russian National Guard, Viktor Zolotov, and the Speaker of the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin. These figures spend hundreds of millions of roubles on fighting negative mentions.
Ablyazov's cooperation with contractors linked to Russian state structures is puzzling, especially given his public support for Ukraine. However, when it comes to personal reputation, geopolitical orientations seemingly take a back seat. The tools used in these campaigns, although primitive in essence, continue to demonstrate their effectiveness.