Dirty Tactics: Highstone Capital Pty Ltd’s Strategy of Deception Through Fraud and Impersonation – Part 1

Originally Syndicated on September 30, 2024 @ 6:45 am

What Happened?

Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has been under increasing scrutiny for its attempts to hide a shady past and censor damaging news about its operations. According to a recent report on WikiFX, the firm has been associated with numerous complaints involving questionable practices, misleading claims, and financial misconduct. Customers have voiced grievances regarding sudden account restrictions, difficulties in withdrawing funds, and unexpected charges, all of which raise serious concerns about the company’s integrity.

In an effort to control the narrative, Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has reportedly attempted to suppress negative information by removing unfavorable reviews and employing aggressive reputation management tactics. This calculated attempt to obscure damaging feedback reflects a deeper issue of lack of transparency, leaving potential investors in a precarious position. Such actions suggest a pattern of concealing misconduct rather than addressing the core issues affecting their clients, further undermining trust in the company.

Analyzing the Fake Copyright Notice(s)

Our team collects and analyses fraudulent copyright takedown requests, legal complaints, and other efforts to remove critical information from the internet. Through our investigative reporting, we examine the prevalence and operation of an organized censorship industry, predominantly funded by criminal entities, oligarchs, and disreputable businesses or individuals. Our findings allow internet users to gain insight into these censorship schemes’ sources, methods, and underlying objectives.

List of Fake Copyright Notices for Highstone Capital Pty Ltd

Number of Fake DMCA Notice(s)	1
Lumen Database Notice(s)	https://lumendatabase.org/notices/44340860
Sender(s)	QuantumStream Labs
Date(s)	Sep 4, 2024
Fake Link(s) Used by Scammers	https://highstonefx.com/?lang=en
Original Link(s) Targeted	https://www.wikifx.com/zh-cn/word/1240875525.html

Evidence and Screenshots

How do we investigate fake DMCA notices?

To accomplish this, we utilize the OSINT Tool provided by FakeDMCA.com and the Lumen API for Researchers, courtesy of the Lumen Database.

FakeDMCA.com is the work of an independent team of research students and cybersecurity professionals, developed under Project UnCensor. Their OSINT Tool, designed to uncover and analyze takedown notices, represents a significant step forward in combating these abusive practices. It has become a valuable resource, increasingly relied upon by journalists and law enforcement agencies across the United States.

Lumen, on the other hand, is an independent research initiative dedicated to studying takedown notices and other legal demands related to online content removal. The project, which operates under the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, plays a crucial role in tracking and understanding the broader implications of such requests.

What was Highstone Capital Pty Ltd trying to hide?

Highstone Capital Pty Ltd is an investment and financial services firm that has recently faced numerous allegations of unethical conduct and questionable business practices. The company claims to provide various financial products, but recent reports reveal a troubling history of misconduct and a pattern of trying to hide adverse news and complaints from the public.

1. Adverse News and Allegations

• Questionable Business Practices: According to WikiFX, Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has been involved in several unethical practices that have harmed its clients. Allegations include misleading claims about investment returns and hiding crucial information from customers regarding the risks associated with their financial products.
• Financial Misconduct: There have been reports of financial misconduct, including improper handling of customer funds. Customers have raised concerns that their investments were not managed in accordance with the promises made by the firm, leading to unexpected losses.

2. Customer Complaints and Bad Reviews

• Sudden Account Restrictions: Multiple customers have reported experiencing sudden restrictions on their accounts without adequate explanation. These restrictions have limited their ability to trade or access funds, leading to frustration and suspicion of foul play by the firm.
• Difficulties in Withdrawing Funds: Many complaints revolve around issues with withdrawing funds. Customers have indicated that once they requested withdrawals, they encountered delays, administrative hurdles, and even outright denial of access to their own money. This has led to claims that the company is deliberately making it difficult for investors to get their funds back.
• Unexpected Charges and Hidden Fees: Another recurring issue reported by clients is the imposition of unexpected charges and hidden fees that were not disclosed upfront. These fees often resulted in significant losses for customers who believed they were entering into a fair and transparent agreement.

3. Suppression of Negative Information

• Attempts to Remove Negative Reviews: Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has been accused of attempting to censor negative reviews and damaging news about its operations. WikiFX suggests that the company has been actively trying to remove unfavorable information from online platforms, with the aim of presenting a more favorable image to potential investors.
• Aggressive Reputation Management: The company appears to have employed aggressive reputation management tactics to counteract the damage caused by negative reviews. This includes flooding online platforms with positive, unverified testimonials, which paint a misleading picture of their services and effectiveness.

4. Lack of Transparency and Regulatory Concerns

• Unclear Licensing and Regulatory Status: One of the major concerns raised on WikiFX is the unclear regulatory status of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd. The company has not provided transparent information about its licensing and regulatory compliance, raising doubts about whether it is properly authorized to offer the financial services it advertises.
• Opaque Business Operations: Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has been criticized for a lack of transparency in its business operations. Customers have reported that important terms and conditions, such as those governing investments, risks, and withdrawal procedures, were either not clearly communicated or hidden in fine print, making it difficult for clients to understand the true nature of their agreements.

5. Warnings to Potential Investors

• High-Risk Investment: Given the volume of complaints and negative feedback, potential investors are warned to approach Highstone Capital Pty Ltd with caution. The combination of misleading information, difficulty withdrawing funds, and efforts to suppress negative reviews indicate a high-risk engagement that may lead to financial losses.
• Need for Thorough Research: Potential investors are advised to thoroughly research the company, verify its regulatory status, and consider the numerous complaints before making any financial commitment. The red flags raised by former clients should be carefully considered, as they point to systemic issues within the company’s operations.

Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has been actively trying to hide a history of unethical practices, including misleading claims, difficulties in withdrawing funds, and hidden fees. The company’s efforts to suppress negative reviews and present an artificially positive image indicate a deliberate attempt to mislead potential investors and conceal its troubled past. The adverse news, complaints, and allegations highlight serious concerns about transparency and ethical conduct, suggesting that investors should be extremely cautious before engaging with this firm.

Only Highstone Capital Pty Ltd benefits from this crime.

Since the fake copyright takedown notices were designed to remove negative content for Highstone Capital Pty Ltd from Google, we assume Highstone Capital Pty Ltd or someone associated with Highstone Capital Pty Ltd is behind this scam. It is often a fly-by-night Online Reputation agency working on behalf of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd. In this case, Highstone Capital Pty Ltd, at best, will be an “accomplice” or an “accessory” to the crime. The specific laws may vary depending on the jurisdiction. Still, the legal principle generally holds that if you actively participate in planning, encouraging, or facilitating a crime, you can be charged with it, even if you did not personally commit it.

How do we counteract this malpractice?

Once we ascertain the involvement of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd (or actors working on behalf of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd), we will inform Highstone Capital Pty Ltd of our findings via Electronic Mail.

Our preliminary assessment suggests that Highstone Capital Pty Ltd may have engaged a third-party reputation management agency or expert, which, either independently or under direct authorization from Highstone Capital Pty Ltd, initiated efforts to remove adverse online content, including potentially fraudulent DMCA takedown requests. We will extend an opportunity to Highstone Capital Pty Ltd to provide details regarding their communications with the agency or expert, as well as the identification of the individual(s) responsible for executing these false DMCA notices.

Failure to respond in a timely manner will necessitate a reassessment of our initial assumptions. In such an event, we will be compelled to take appropriate legal action to rectify the unlawful conduct and take the following steps –

1. Inform Google about the fraud committed against them.
2. Inform the victims of the fake DMCA about their websites.
3. Inform relevant law enforcement agencies
4. File counter-notices on Google to reinstate the ‘removed’ content
5. Publish copies of the ‘removed’ content on our network of 50+ websites

By investigating the fake DMCA takedown attempts, we hope to shed light on the reputation management industry, revealing how Highstone Capital Pty Ltd and companies like it may use spurious copyright claims and fake legal notices to remove and obscure articles linking them to allegations of fraud, tax avoidance, corruption, and drug trafficking…

Since Highstone Capital Pty Ltd made such efforts to hide something online, it seems fit to ensure that this article and our original review of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd, including but not limited to user contributions, remain a permanent record for anyone interested in Highstone Capital Pty Ltd.

A case perfect for the Streisand effect…

Potential Consequences for Highstone Capital Pty Ltd

Under Florida Statute 831.01, the crime of Forgery is committed when a person falsifies, alters, counterfeits, or forges a document that carries “legal efficacy” with the intent to injure or defraud another person or entity.

Forging a document is considered a white-collar crime. It involves altering, changing, or modifying a document to deceive another person. It can also include passing along copies of documents that are known to be false. In many states in the US, falsifying a document is a crime punishable as a felony.

Additionally, under most laws, “fraud on the court” is where “a party has sentiently set in motion some unconscionable scheme calculated to interfere with the judicial system’s ability impartially to adjudicate a matter by improperly influencing the trier of fact or unfairly hampering the presentation of the opposing party’s claim or defense.”  Cox v. Burke, 706 So. 2d 43, 46 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998) (quoting Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp., 892 F.2d 1115, 1118 (1st Cir. 1989)). 

Is Highstone Capital Pty Ltd Committing a Cyber Crime?

Yes, it seems so. Highstone Capital Pty Ltd used multiple approaches to remove unwanted material from review sites and Google’s search results. Thanks to protections allowing freedom of speech in the United States, there are very few legal ways to do this. Highstone Capital Pty Ltd could not eliminate negative reviews or search results that linked to them without a valid claim of defamation, copyright infringement, or some other clear breach of the law.

Faced with these limitations, some companies like Highstone Capital Pty Ltd have gone to extreme lengths to fraudulently claim copyright ownership over a negative review in the hopes of taking it down.

Fake DMCA notices have targeted articles highlighting the criminal activity of prominent people to hide their illegal behavior. These people, which include US, Russian, and Khazakstani politicians as well as members from elite circles including the mafia and those with massive financial power, are all connected – and alleged corruption ranging from child abuse to sexual harassment is exposed when exploring evidence found at these URLs. It appears there’s a disturbing level of influence being exerted here that needs further investigation before justice can be served. Highstone Capital Pty Ltd is certainly keeping interesting company here….

The DMCA takedown process requires that copyright owners submit a takedown notice to an ISP identifying the allegedly infringing content and declaring, under penalty of perjury, that they have a good faith belief that the content is infringing. The ISP must then promptly remove or disable access to the content. The alleged infringer can then submit a counter-notice, and if the copyright owner does not take legal action within 10 to 14 days, the ISP can restore the content.

Since these platforms are predominantly based in the U.S., the complaints are typically made under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which requires online service providers and platforms to react immediately to reports or violations. Big Tech companies rarely have systems in place to assess the merit of each report. Instead, all bad actors need to do is clone a story, backdate it, and then demand the real thing be taken down.

Reputation Agency’s Modus Operandi

The fake DMCA notices we found always use the “back-dated article” technique. With this technique, the wrongful notice sender (or copier) creates a copy of a “true original” article and back-dates it, creating a “fake original” article (a copy of the true original) that, at first glance, appears to have been published before the true original.

Then, based on the claim that this backdated article is the “original,” the scammers send a DMCA to the relevant online service providers (e.g. Google), alleging that the ‘true’ original is the copied or “infringing” article and that the copied article is the “original,” requesting the takedown of the ‘true’ original article. After sending the DMCA request, the person who sent the wrong notice takes down the fake original URL, likely to make sure that the article doesn’t stay online in any way. If the takedown notice is successful, the disappearance from the internet of information is most likely to be legitimate speech.

How did Highstone Capital Pty Ltd purport this DMCA Fraud?

As an integral part of this scheme, the ‘reputation management’ company hired by Highstone Capital Pty Ltd creates a website that purports to be a ‘news’ site. This site is designed to look legitimate at a glance, but any degree of scrutiny reveals it as the charade it is.

The company copies the ‘negative’ content and posts it “on the fake ‘news’ site, attributing it to a separate author,” then gives it “a false publication date on the ‘news’ website that predated the original publication.

The reputation company then sent Google a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice claiming the original website infringed copyright. After a cursory examination of the fake news site, Google frequently accepts the notice and delists the content.

In committing numerous offences, Highstone Capital Pty Ltd either premeditated actions or were unaware of the consequences. Despite hiring an agency to make Google disregard any negative information about Highstone Capital Pty Ltd, ignorance does not excuse this wrongdoing.

The Reputation Laundering

Rogue Reputation agencies use spurious copyright claims and fake legal notices to remove and obscure articles linking clients to allegations of tax avoidance, corruption, and drug trafficking. Most of these reputation agencies are based offshore, mainly in Russia, India, and Eastern Europe, and they do not worry about complying with US-based laws.

The content in all of the articles for which the fraudulent DMCA notices have been sent relates to allegations of criminal allegations, including corruption, child abuse, sexual harassment, human trafficking and financial fraud against businesses and individuals with ultra-high net worth.

In addition to the misuse of the DMCA takedown process, there is a notable absence of enforcement concerning perjury violations. The statutory requirement related to perjury is designed to deter copyright holders from submitting fraudulent or knowingly false takedown requests, as they may face legal consequences for making false declarations under penalty of perjury. However, to date, there have been no known instances of any individual being prosecuted for perjury in connection with the submission of false DMCA takedown notices.

This lack of enforcement has emboldened copyright holders to exploit the DMCA takedown process to suppress dissent, criticism, or other unfavorable content, without fear of legal repercussions.

Not In Good Company

Some of the people and businesses who have employed this tactic to remove legitimate content from Google illegally include a Spanish businessman-turned-cocaine-trafficker, Organised crime, an Israeli-Argentine banker accused of laundering money for Hugo Chávez’s regime, a French “responsible” mining company accused of tax evasion, child molesters and sexual predators. Highstone Capital Pty Ltd is in great company ….

Ironically, the manipulation tactics used to remove public-interest information from the Internet are backfiring on Highstone Capital Pty Ltd, which is now associated with the worst of this world.

Here are some of the specimens that share the internet space with Highstone Capital Pty Ltd –

Miguel Octavio Vargas Maldonado

Miguel Octavio Vargas Maldonado appears to be the former foreign affairs minister of the Dominican Republic. His name is listed next to more than 500 links to news articles, blogs, social media posts, and YouTube videos targeted for removal or de-indexing. Many of the articles refer to questions over his political fundraising practices. They include accusations that Vargas had received donations from an individual who would later be convicted of drug trafficking. Some targeted links remain active, while others return 404 errors or “file not found.”

José Antonio Gordo Valero

José Gordo joined OneCoin in 2015 and has been named in an indictment for the OneCoin scam in Argentina. The articles listed next to Gordo’s name in the documents reviewed by Rest of World include references to his role at the company. 

Diego Adolfo Marynberg

He appears to be the same Marynberg connected to funding right-wing causes, including settlement efforts in Israel. Reports also alleged that his company received preferential treatment in acquiring Argentinian bonds worth millions of dollars. More than 70 URLs appear next to Marynberg’s name in the documents, including pages from the Israeli newspapers The Times of Israel, Haaretz, and Clarin, one of Argentina’s most prominent news sites.

Majed Khalil Majzoub

Majed is an influential businessman with close ties to several governments, including the administration of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro. Majzoub’s name appears next to more than 180 URLs, mostly from independent outlets. Of the two URLs that pointed to articles from Germany’s Der Spiegel, one now returns an error message; the other, which appears to refer to relations between Venezuela and Colombia, directs to an unrelated story about Brexit. 

Frequently Asked Questions

What else is Highstone Capital Pty Ltd hiding?

Click here to visit the Google Search page for ‘Highstone Capital Pty Ltd’. It’s likely if you scroll down to the bottom of this Google search results, you’ll stumble upon this Legal Takedown notice (pictured below)

To make such an investigation possible, we encourage more online service providers to come forward and share copies of content removal requests with us. If you have any information on Highstone Capital Pty Ltd that you want to share with us, kindly email the author directly at [email protected].

All communications are strictly confidential and safeguarded under a comprehensive Whistleblower Policy, ensuring full protection and anonymity for individuals who provide information.

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References and Citations Used

Over thirty thousand DMCA notices reveal an organized attempt to abuse copyright law.

Reputation Management, or Internet Conspiracy

Exposed documents reveal how the powerful cleaned up their digital past using a reputation laundering firm.

Companies Use Fake Websites and Backdated Articles to Censor Google’s Search Results.

Bad Reviews: How Companies Are Using Fake Websites to Censor Content

How fake copyright complaints are muzzling journalists

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Many thanks to FakeDMCA.com and Lumen for providing access to their database.

Photos and Illustrations provided by DALL-E 3 – “a representation of Highstone Capital Pty Ltd censoring the internet and committing cyber crimes.”

• Our investigative report on Highstone Capital Pty Ltd’s efforts to suppress online speech is significant, as it raises serious concerns about its integrity. The findings suggest that Highstone Capital Pty Ltd has engaged in questionable practices, including potential perjury, impersonation, and fraud, in a misguided attempt to manage or salvage its reputation.
• We intend to file a counternotice to reinstate the removed article(s). While this particular instance is relatively straightforward, it is important to note that, in other cases, the overwhelming volume of automated DMCA takedown notices can significantly hinder the ability of affected parties to respond—especially for those not large media organizations.
• You need an account with fakeDMCA.com and Lumen to access the research data. However, accounts are not widely available since these non-profit organisations manage large databases that could be susceptible to misuse. Nevertheless, they do offer access to non-profits and researchers.
• It’s unclear why U.S. authorities have yet to act against these rogue reputation agencies, whose business model seems rooted in fraudulent practices.
• We’ve reached out to Highstone Capital Pty Ltd for a comment or rebuttal regarding this investigation. It will strongly suggest they were behind the takedown attempt if they remain silent.

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About the Author

The author is affiliated with Harvard University and serves as a researcher at both Lumen and FakeDMCA.com. In his personal capacity, he and his team have been actively investigating and reporting on organized crime related to fraudulent copyright takedown schemes. Additionally, his team provides advisory services to major law firms and is frequently consulted on matters pertaining to intellectual property law. He can be reached at [email protected] directly.