By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick Five years ago, a social media scheduling app called Buffer was hacked and began sending spam messages to audiences of social channels belonging to their clients. It’s bad news for any company that utilises social media for marketing or reputation management, but the way Buffer handled the hack provides the perfect case study for what responses work best in crisis situations. What happened On the Saturday afternoon, Buffer users began tw

By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick As residents of Sydney’s now infamous Opal Tower were hoping to return to their apartments on Boxing Day, the building’s developer was getting a little ahead of himself. Bassam Aflak, director of the building’s developer Ecove, declared the tower was “high-quality” and launched an attack on the “sensational” media. The only reason for the coverage, according to Aflak, was because “it happened over the Christmas break”. What’s followed is

By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick It’s one of the world’s largest airlines…with a very large customer database. On September 5, British Airways discovered their database had been hacked, with credit card and personal information from 380,000 British Airways travellers compromised. The pressure was on British Airways to protect their brand and reassure their customers and they nailed it with a transparent and bold response. What happened From August 21 to September 5, a f

By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick A few weeks have now passed since the Australian strawberry industry was brought to its knees. The needle scandal was large enough to activate an Australian Federal Police investigation along with significant attention from the Federal Government. Images, videos and articles flooded traditional and social media with graphic warnings of needles submerged in strawberries and a whole nation rallying behind the industry. When dozens of entit

By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick The Perth Mint is one of the last standing branches of the UK’s Royal Mint and has been the gold centre for many clients across Western Australia. It is one of only two Australian mints legally issuing coins for the Australian dollar. With over AUD 3.1 billion in client gold and silver deposits, a data breach of the mint would create concern for many. That’s exactly what happened last month, when the Perth Mint noticed signs of a data br

By Michelle Wang and James Fitzpatrick Recently, some brands were found to have tampered with (or “adulterate”) their honey, mixing in ingredients other than nectar from bees. This scandal has dominated the news headlines in the first week of September because it involves more than one brand who all fall under the same product category. The issue has become so topical that the ACCC has launched an official investigation. It’s also a perfect example for when you should or shou

By Georgia Comensoli and James Fitzpatrick It’s the privacy leak that may change our interaction with social media outlets forever. It has spurred government investigations globally and cost the world’s largest social media outlet $150 billion. What happened to Facebook? They let a fire get out of control before throwing water on it. What happened? UK based data company, Cambridge Analytica, gathered the information of millions of Facebook profiles without users knowing. They

By Georgia Comensoli and James Fitzpatrick It’s not often we see a company successfully manage and bounce back from a crisis as well as Lush has over the past twelve months. The Australian cosmetics giant has been dealing with a scandal involving the underpayment of employees across the company. The issue traces back to 2010 with nearly 6000 employees affected. In August last year, an employee of the franchise raised concerns with their head office, detailing how employees we

By Georgia Comensoli and James Fitzpatrick Did Optus read Crisis Shield’s latest case study on their coverage? Because we've been impressed by their response. Optus had exclusive rights to this year's Soccer World Cup, sharing only select games with almost 30-year world cup broadcaster, SBS. As previously reported, their coverage hit many road bumps in sensational fashion. Optus came under intense scrutiny from consumers, infuriated by sub-par coverage and ever consistent scr

By Georgia Comensoli and James Fitzpatrick AMP’s response, in a media flooded with accusations After years of pressure from corporate watchdogs, politicians (on both sides), media, whistle blowers, and special interest groups, the Banking Royal Commission (BRC) was established. For some it’s been a long time coming while others are wishing they jumped ship before December last year. The BRC’s task is to uncover misconduct and unlawful behaviour at Australia’s largest financia