Talk:Avisa Partners

Page overhaul

This whole article was full of WP:NPOV instances, as well as containing what I'm pretty sure are WP:BLP issues. I find it weird that the article tries so hard to link Avisa Partners to Russia through the use of terms like "oligarch" and adding Internet Research Agency in the "see also", where there is no such connection made in any of the sources. The placing of the article in an otherwise empty category called "French propaganda organisations" is also not great.

So much of the article was problematic that it was easier to just completely overhaul it using a slightly trimmed down version of the French language article. That article is by no means perfect, but it's definitely an improvement. There is still work to be done, like translating the better infobox found in the French article or adding better sources for some of the claims. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:44, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

@PraiseVivec: The French article is currently the result of a history of abuse, so there is no justification in starting with a translation of the French version. I actually read the sources that were most independent of the subject of this article, and least likely to have conflicts of interest with it. The majority of the French media's investigations show that the major activity of the company is in fake news. There is no obligation for the English version to follow from the French version. You have removed most of the French media coverage of this organisation, and shifted it to a "Controversies" section at the end of the article. That is a violation of WP:DUE. I will revert your changes in a moment.

Please try making changes in a modular way, after reading and understanding the sources, without destroying significant, sourced content.

An example of the destructive role of translating the French-language article is that one of the strongest claims of the organisation having an activity that is not fake news is Avisa Partners provides services in four key areas: cybersecurity, risk management and the fight against financial crime, international relations, as well as public affairs and strategic communication.[citation needed] - with no source.

Please try working on this article constructively.

Regarding "oligarch": there is no particular distinction that I'm aware of between "businessperson" and "oligarch", so you're welcome to switch to "businessperson"; regarding Internet Research Agency: this is based on the majority of independent sources.

Thanks in advance for responding constructively. Boud (talk) 21:23, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

So is the current version a translation of the French page? I think this may call for a revert if so; otherwise we’ll be stuck trying to figure out how far French admins have gotten with their cleanup. Note: a claim is not a BLP issue if it is well-sourced. Elinruby (talk) 21:34, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

This version by PraiseVivec looks like more or less a word-for-word translation of the fr.Wikipedia version (PraiseVivec clearly stated on the talk page here that s/he wrote a slightly trimmed down version of the fr.Wikipedia article; given the messy history of that article, there might be undetected copyvios there, but I would rather guess that it's not a copyvio); this version by me is my version, written directly based on what I could find in what seemed to be the main sources, that I reverted to a few minutes ago. Boud (talk) 21:43, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

PraiseVivec wrote: full of WP:NPOV instances. This is a positive thing, consistent with Wikipedia policy. We want Wikipedia content to have a neutral point of view. If you meant something different to "WP:NPOV instances", then please state what you mean in plain English, because otherwise other Wikipedians have to guess what you are trying to say. I suspect that you mean "violation of WP:NPOV", so I'll start a section on this talk page based on that hypothesis. Boud (talk) 22:26, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

slightly confused about why the revert is smaller than the addition, but I am still skimming the surface on this. Had seen some stories about the Uber files in Le Monde but did not realize there was more than Uber. Bottom line, if you are satisfied with the current version as a starting point we can go from there. Elinruby (talk) 22:29, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

The arithmetic is that PraiseVivec added the trimmed translation of the fr.Wikipedia version, adding 20263 bytes; and then removed the references section completely, subtracting 9280 bytes; so that's why my revert added about 11000 bytes. Anyway, oldid 1101806962 of 22:39, 1 August 2022‎ is a good basis for further edits in my judgment. Hopefully PraiseVivec will agree to work in a modular way on this article. Boud (talk) 22:50, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

West Africa

I would like to read some more about their activities in Kinshasa and Cote d’Ivoire. I am willing to put some work into the article on this aspect, as helping with any French language issues. Elinruby (talk) 21:30, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I don’t think you need in-text attribution to call Nguesso a dictator Elinruby (talk) 22:47, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I disagree, especially under WP:BLP: we need sources. If the sources are solid enough (e.g. 3 strong sources), then removing the attribution "described as by..." might be justified. Some of the more solid sources might be found at Democracy Index or Democracy-Dictatorship Index, although whether an index describing a country as a dictatorship implies that the leader is him/herself considered by that source to be a dictator would require an extra step of reasoning - a country that overall is best characterised as a dictatorship, but is run by a small tight-knit junta, does not necessarily qualify the leader him/herself as being a dictator (s/he might even be their figurehead). Democracy Index 2021, per the current state of the article, says Rep of Congo is 2.79 = Authoritarian; Democracy-Dictatorship Index says that an unarchived GAFAM personal web page, apparently controlled by the author of a peer-reviewed article on the topic, characterised Rep of Congo in either 2008 (per text editing) or 2019 (per the claimed retrieval date of the unarchived webpage) or 20xx (per the user who did the edit), as Dictatorship - Military Dictatorship. Anyway, let's see if there are some solid sources directly about Nguesso. Currently, the article Denis Sassou Nguesso gives very little hint about him being a dictator - he's just a guy who won his third presidential election in 2016 with 60% of the vote and his fourth one with 88%, and with (currently 23:19, 1 August 2022 (UTC)) no links to the election pages, requiring the reader to make an extra effort to even judge how fair the elections were. It would be better to update that article first, obtaining consensus on the BLP issue, and then update the description here after consensus over there. Boud (talk) 23:19, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

ok, *right now* it may be needed. The sources are likely however thick on the ground. Elinruby (talk) 00:09, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

This is interesting, but right now I am looking for well-known sources that aren’t paywalled and specifically use the word Elinruby (talk) 00:23, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

The archived version is non-paywalled. But I don't see "dictator"; "one of the world’s longest-sitting heads of state", "subject of corruption investigations in France", but I don't see the equivalent of "dictator". Boud (talk) 00:34, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

also interesting but uses emperor not dictator Elinruby (talk) 00:28, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

A paper by an academic researcher, e.g. something at https://www.cairn.info would be good. Boud (talk) 00:34, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Maybe "Congo-Brazzaville, Une septième Constitution pour quoi faire ?", Félix Bankounda, Dans Politique africaine 2001/1 (N° 81), pages 163 à 170, which more or less says that he's a dictator: Pour lui, l'exercice du pouvoir n'est nullement lié à la Constitution, il la détermine unilatéralement et s'en délie n'importe comment, quand bon lui semble. For a country's leader to make decisions unilaterally however and whenever he feels like it independent of the constitution seems a reasonable fit to the word "dictator". But that only says that he was a dictator as of 2001, which leaves out the last two decades of his presidency. Boud (talk) 00:47, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Several of the sources at our side discussion describe Nguesso as a former dictator. Whether we personally consider "former" to be credible or not is irrelevant for the content of the article. This clearly raises the WP:RELTIME problem for describing a living person. Using an adjective that is already or is quite likely to become out-of-date makes an article look silly when it's no longer actively maintained. Boud (talk) 01:21, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

I think that anyone whose nickname is “emperor” is probably an autocrat. I also think “former dictator” probably refers to an intervening election, but I respect your scruples on this and will look into it a little more. I was looking specifically for “dictator” but I also saw him referred to as a “kleptocrat” and a strongman” and would be fine with either of those descriptors. His son took power when he died, btw ;) as one does in democracies ;) but ok, I agree that the sourcing should be impeccable. Will come back to this as I am fairly certain it’s common knowledge Elinruby (talk) 08:05, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

come to think of it, he died in 2021, so if the sources are recent this may be all that the sources meant by “former”. But as you correctly point out, there are other fish to fry here Elinruby (talk) 08:08, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Are you sure that he died? In that case, it would seem that he has been reincarnated, according to Africanews. Guy Brice Parfait Kolélas died in March 2021, per an unreliable source (Wikipedia). Boud (talk) 20:04, 4 August 2022‎

Point-by-point constructive editing

@PraiseVivec: I propose that you start by adding content sections that you think are missing, and verify that the sources are sufficiently independent and genuinely support the claims. For example, it's quite possible that the organisation carries out some activities that do not involve fake news, in which case you could add sentences with sources for that. Individual points can be discussed in individual sections here on the talk page if needed. Boud (talk) 21:48, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

After achieving consensus on sections in the body of the article, then consensing on the lead will be easier. Boud (talk) 22:05, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

See also section

PraiseVivec wrote: terms like "oligarch" and adding Internet Research Agency in the "see also", where there is no such connection made in any of the sources. MOS:SEEALSO states Whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense. One purpose of "See also" links is to enable readers to explore tangentially related topics; however, articles linked should be related to the topic of the article or be in the same defining category.

We have plenty of WP:RS stating that Avisa Partners is a propaganda organisation. Whether it is also called a lobbying organisation or a consulting group does not change the sourced fact by multiple reliable sources that one of Avisa Partners' well-documented activities is propaganda. The See also section is specifically for articles that are tangentially related. Publishing fake articles is common to Internet Research Agency and Avisa Partners. I don't understand the objection to putting Internet Research Agency in the See also section. Boud (talk) 22:05, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Oligarch

If we look at meaning 2 of wikt:oligarch and compare to wikt:businessperson, then we would have to look in the sources as to whether they describe the wealthy businesspeople such as Bernard Arnault as "wielding political power". Bernard Arnault#Politics currently says nothing about Arnault wielding any political power, and even if there are COI risks for that Wikipedia page, we could probably change to "businesspeople" (Arnault is the about the most prominent one listed in the sources). Our own guesses that ultra-rich people wield political power don't count. Boud (talk) 22:05, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Don’t have an opinion at the moment on whether he did or not, but am ok with changing to “businessman” on the understanding that it may matter change back based on sources Elinruby (talk) 22:24, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

 Done Boud (talk) 22:40, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Based on a skim of his fr.wiki page it will probably change back, but not only is that not a source, it’s one of the pages tampered with. I am not familiar with Fakir or Marianne. Has the fr.wiki equivalent of RS said anything about this, do you know? Elinruby (talk) 22:58, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree that neither en.Wikipedia nor fr.Wikipedia are valid sources, but, apart from known cases of tampering, they are useful hints as to what is likely to achieve editorial consensus, at least within the same language Wikipedia. fr:Wikipédia:Observatoire_des_sources lists Marianne as a good secondary source, which I personally would agree with. I don't see Fakir there, so it's currently neither opposed nor supported; the fr.Wikipedia article describes it as independent and left-wing, with one individual incident of an issue being criticised by the extreme left on the issue of workers' rights vs environmental protection. Boud (talk) 00:20, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

nod, that is pretty much how I read the Fakir page. I think it is still not well-known because it only recently went national Elinruby (talk) 10:55, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

came in here to point out this source on Arnault — I think political strategizing with the current French President might be an indicator of political power Elinruby (talk) 10:55, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Also [1] Elinruby (talk) 11:57, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

and [2] Elinruby (talk) 12:10, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Categories

We have plenty of WP:RS stating that Avisa Partners is a propaganda organisation, so Category:French propaganda organisations is overwhelmingly supported by the sources. @PraiseVivec: do you claim that the sources do not describe Avisa Partners as a French propaganda organisation? Boud (talk) 22:05, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Consider Disinformation as well Elinruby (talk) 22:46, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Category:French propaganda organisations is a sub-category of Category:Disinformation operations, which is a sub-category of Category:Disinformation, and generally (there are some rare exceptions), an article should go in the most specific categories only, not super-categories. To make it obvious: we don't want a specific example of a big blue round object to be in all of Category:big_blue_round_objects and Category:blue_round_objects and Category:round_objects and Category:objects; we only want it to be in Category:big_blue_round_objects. So this article is already in a sub-sub-category of Category:Disinformation. Boud (talk) 00:04, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Agreed, just didn’t realize that they are in the same hierarchy Elinruby (talk) 17:34, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

NPOV TODO list

Reliably sourced points of view that are missing from this version and need to be integrated into the text include the following. (Please either read the sources and integrate their content, or add them here for other people to integrate the content.) Boud (talk) 22:36, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

BLP issues

Problems concerning the WP:BLP policy in this version are the following. (Please explain any BLP issues here so that consensus can be obtained on them.) Boud (talk) 22:36, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

• See the section Talk:Avisa Partners#West Africa above regarding whether we can say that Denis Sassou Nguesso is described as a dictator, based on the source we have or more sources, and what words should be used. Boud (talk) 23:22, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Digital communication

This version by PraiseVivec stated At the time of its creation, the company was called iStrat and the main expertise of the firm was then Digital Communication.[2], where [2] is the current Rue 89 reference "Rue89_rightwing_web_vs_Hollande". The link redirects to data communication, on the topic of the transfer and reception of data in the form of a digital bitstream or a digitized analog signal[1] over a point-to-point or point-to-multipoint communication channel, while the Rue 89 source put « communication digitale » in French quotes (guillemets), suggesting scare quotes, suggesting that Rue 89 wasn't really sure what that was supposed to mean. The Rue 89 article cites a blog on its own site by Creux and one on Atlantico, so it seems that on this point, Rue 89 is really just quoting Creux's own description of what iStrat does, and illustrates it by showing that he published a few blog items.

It seems that we could use this to say that iStrat started out publishing under Creux's own name, except that we don't know if the blog items count as "work by iStrat" or work by Creux who happens to lead iStrat, at the time. In any case, we can't just copy/paste this as a raw translation, and I don't understand how it's a strong source on what iStrat actually does (or did at the time).

It would be good to have a reliable, independent source that clearly claims that iStrat/Avisa Partners/Maelstrom Media has done something significant apart from publish fake news. Boud (talk) 01:47, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

ANI notice

This article is the subject of a discussion at the Administrators' noticeboard, involving cross-wiki abuse and COI editing. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 04:20, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Consolidated comments on current article

Following on the exchanges from the Admin's noticeboard, and in the spirit of good faith, I’m listing below in consolidated form the main issues I found in the original entry for Avisa Partners, which prompted me to rewrite it based on the French page. You can consult my version here.

1. “Avisa Partners or Maelstrom Media or iStrat”

The inaccuracies in this article begin from the name of the company in the lede, which is plainly inaccurate. However, I’m not inclined to criticize anyone too harshly for this, as there is a certain amount of confusion here, as Mediapart explains. Maelstrom Media is in fact a subcontractor of Avisa Partners, while iStrat is one of the former names of the company. The company changed names a number of times throughout the years, most recently in 2018 when it adopted the name Avisa from an older company it acquired.

“En 2021, ses recherches le mettent sur la piste de Maelstrom Media, un prestataire d’Avisa Partners, entreprise française spécialisée en intelligence économique et en cybersécurité.” [1]

This is one of the places where the French article is much more useful, while the current article only discusses this in passing and uses several names interchangeably to refer to the whole group, as in “based on no research or expertise in the subjects, for iStrat known under an alternative name, Maelstrom Media”.

Based on the sources listed below, I would propose as a WP:NPOV lede of the article:

Avisa Partners is a French consulting group specializing in cybersecurity, economic intelligence, investigations and public relations. Headquartered in Paris, the company is present in seven other countries.

In 2022, the group was mentioned in several journalistic investigations, in particular within the framework of the Uber Files, for having manipulated information on a large scale on numerous online media as well as on Wikipedia.

2. “French disinformation firm created in 2009.”

The source used does not back up the statement that Avisa is a “disinformation” firm. Moreover, the extract from the EU Transparency Register describes Avisa as a

“public affairs consultancy, which focuses on certain clearly identified policy issues in which we claim real expertise: competition, trade, regulatory affairs (e.g. digital and media, energy, environment, telecommunications, financial services and corporate social responsibility), online advocacy and cyber-security.”

Similar wording is used in the following sources [2][3][4][5][6][7], that describe the scope of Avisa’s activities, The French version of the article, as well as the version I drafted yesterday use the labels found in these sources. The way this article uses the label of “disinformation” in Wikipedia’s voice, rather than in quotes from reliable sources is pretty clearly against WP:NPOV and quite possibly WP:OR.

As such, I suggest expanding the section accordingly to respect WP:DUE, as the information above is adapted from trustworthy sources.

3. "Avisa Partners was created in 2009, when it was registered with the European Union Transparency Register, and initially called iStrat. Around 2019, Avisa Partners bought the German firm International Dialogue Advisors (IDA) Group, the London firm Gabara Strategies Ltd, and opened an office in Washington, D.C."

As multiple sources describe it, the company was created in 2010 and has gone through a series of acquisitions, which are not reflected on the current version of the page. It changed its name in 2015 to Demeter Partners and to Avisa Partners in 2018 after buying Lexfo and Avisa, a Brussels-based public affairs company, whose name it took. The 2009 registration with the EU Transparency Register is explained by the fact that the Register was created in its current form in 2008 and included the Brussels-based Avisa before it was acquired by the subject of the article.

Further acquisitions backed by multiple independent sources in French and English, that are nonetheless absent from this article include the Compagnie Européenne d’Intelligence Stratégique in 2020, the Observatoire des pays arabes and 35° Nord in 2021, and Leakid and Databack in 2022 – all present on the French version of the page.[8][9][10][11][12]

To your point about fake news being at the core of the business, these acquisitions back up my proposed lede. The company’s operations in multiple fields and capacities are very well documented,[13][14] I don’t see why the recent revelations about ghostwriting should completely take over the whole page. An easy way to test this is to ask yourself if there are enough sources to make the company notable before the recent wave of revelations. And there definitely are.

Similarly, I suggest expanding the section with the acquisitions of the group etc.

4. “Fake online commentary” section

An overarching comment that applies to not only this section, but the entirety of the current version of the page is that both WP:DUE and WP:RECENT are likely breached, and the section should be rewritten to fit encyclopedic standards.

5. The Mediapart investigations use conditional language to describe Avisa’s activities, while the Wikipedia article does not

“It is a story that, potentially, involves the widespread contamination of online information”

“The economic intelligence company Avisa Partners […] already stands accused of manipulating information on participative forums on French and foreign media, including Mediapart, as we reported in June […] Now the same firm is also suspected of having successfully infiltrated the online collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia. The reported aim is to change pages to secretly promote its clients or denigrate competitors”

It seems weird to me that an investigative journalism article uses language that is more nuanced than a Wikipedia article.

6.    Unsubstantiated claims of disinformation

“Clients for which Avisa Partners published disinformation include the European Commission, the French Ministry of Armed Forces, CAC 40 businesses including LVMH and Société Générale, Kazakhstan, and president of the Republic of the Congo Denis Sassou Nguesso, described by Marianne as a dictator.^”

The above section is partly based on the Marianne source, which is in itself, based on a Mediapart investigation. The exact quote does not suggest that Avisa Partners “published disinformation” for the European Commission, French Ministry of Armed Forces, Société Générale, etc.[14]

“En 2020, le fondateur d’Avisa, Matthieu Creux, détaillait au magazine Causeur une partie de son impressionnante clientèle : Interpol, le Ghana, la Côte d’Ivoire, Saint-Marin, le Togo, la Commission européenne, le ministère des armées, BNP Paribas, la Société générale, le Crédit agricole, la Banque Palatine, Axa, CNP Assurances, Engie, EDF, Total, L’Oréal, LVMH, Chanel, Carrefour, Casino, etc.”

Instead, Mediapart says that clients Avisa worked for to produce “online advocacy” include Congo-Brazzavile, Kazakhstan, Qatar, Chad, Rusal, Venezuela’s oil company, Bayer (among others):

Des documents internes à Avisa, obtenus par Mediapart, montrent aujourd’hui une palette plus vaste encore de « clients étatiques », dont certains pays qui sentent le soufre. Cela concerne par exemple l’« e-réputation » (réputation sur Internet) de la présidence du Congo-Brazzaville, dirigé depuis des décennies d’une main de fer par le dictateur Denis Sassou Nguesso, l’autocratie du Kazakhstan, en Asie centrale, pour l’organisation d’une exposition internationale, la pétromonarchie du Qatar pour la promotion de ses investissements en Europe et du Mondial 2022, le Tchad pour la valorisation des réformes économiques du dictateur Idriss Déby, la société nationale pétrolière du Venezuela contre les sanctions américaines qui la visent.

Mais aussi le géant russe de l’aluminium Rusal pour diverses opérations de lobbying, la multinationale pharmaceutique et agrochimique Bayer pour la publication de contenus sur les réseaux sociaux afin de « contrer l’activisme anti-OGM » ou l’avionneur Airbus.

7. Recentism

Proof of WP:RECENT can be found in the comparison with articles of similar companies. Looking at the pages of Edelman and APCO Worldwide, you can see sizeable Controversies sections and, at least in the case of Edelman, clear mention of said controverses in the lede, but without the NPOV-breaching language of the Avisa Partners article, which is clearly influenced by the current media coverage.

Let me know if you have any objections. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:08, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

I completely object to trying to handle all 7 points in a single talk page section. That would make it impractical to converge on any of the points.

Instead, I will select whichever of your points above seems like it might have the easiest chance of converging, and start discussions on that in an appropriate section on this talk page. Boud (talk) 17:36, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Point 2 "French disinformation firm created in 2009." seems to be a mix of trying to converge on the text and sources to use in the lead, versus a discussion of the organisation's self-description that seems to be more or less quoted in several sources, without it being clear if the sources actually verified the information or not. It seems to be easiest to leave the lead until last, since the lead should summarise the content, and is already the theme of point 1. So this really seems to be a subpoint of 3, which is on creation date, growth and activities, so I'll see if we can deal with it in the existing talk page section. Boud (talk) 22:52, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Status of the 7-point list

As of 01:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC), my understanding of the status of the 7-point list is:

1. lead – valid concern; not yet done  ToDo
2. part is about the lead; part is about 3.3 Activities: Talk:Avisa Partners#Activities - Point 2  Done
3. this is 3.1 Creation date + 3.2 growth + 3.3: Talk:Avisa Partners#Creation date, growth and activities  Done
4. there are no specific concerns concerning the article section Fake online commentary listed in this point; remember WP:NOTPAPER Not done – empty request
5. use of conditional language, as in the use of "alleged" for criminal accusations on BLP articles – valid concern  ToDo
6. source–text mismatches about disinformation for specific clients – valid concern, needs checking  ToDo
7. Recentism: WP:RECENT – since we lack sources about Avisa Partners' earlier activities (under its early names), we are necessarily biased in favour of recent info, since that's the info we have; if/when we have more sources, we can update based on those sources; WP:WHATABOUTX is not a strong argument, and in this particular case, for the choice of structure: we don't have a Controversies section in Internet Research Agency, for example. I think that first we should focus on seeing if we have better sources, and double-check that we're summarising the sources fairly.  Maybe

Boud (talk) 01:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Point 6: clients/disinformation

Clients for which Avisa Partners published disinformation include ... The list of clients that is public to non-subscribed readers on the Marianne source does not say if any or which of the clients had disinformation produced for them by Avisa Partners, only that they have been clients. Since this is the 'Clients' section, whether or not any specific clients had disinformation produced for them can be handled by adding more detail justified by, preferably, publicly available content. Boud (talk) 16:16, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

 Done Boud (talk) 16:19, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Status of the 7-point list (bis)

As of 22:34, 3 August 2022 (UTC), my understanding of the status of the 7-point list is:

1. lead – Talk:Avisa Partners#Lead: Point 1  Done
2. part is about the lead; part is about 3.3 Activities: Talk:Avisa Partners#Activities - Point 2  Done
3. this is 3.1 Creation date + 3.2 growth + 3.3: Talk:Avisa Partners#Creation date, growth and activities  Done
4. no specific concerns on section Fake online commentary; remember WP:NOTPAPER Not done – empty request
5. use of conditional language, as in the use of "alleged" for criminal accusations on BLP articles – Talk:Avisa Partners#Definite vs conditional language has been opened for debate by those interested  Done
6. source–text mismatches about disinformation for specific clients – Talk:Avisa Partners#Point 6: clients/disinformation  Done
7. Recentism: WP:RECENT – we lack sources for earlier activities by the organisation; without sources, there's no point debating what we should say about earlier activities  Maybe

Boud (talk) 22:34, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Creation date, growth and activities

(Reproduced from above so that we can have a specific, RS'd based discussion and a chance of conversion. Boud (talk) 17:46, 2 August 2022 (UTC))

3. "Avisa Partners was created in 2009, when it was registered with the European Union Transparency Register, and initially called iStrat. Around 2019, Avisa Partners bought the German firm International Dialogue Advisors (IDA) Group, the London firm Gabara Strategies Ltd, and opened an office in Washington, D.C."

As multiple sources describe it, the company was created in 2010 and has gone through a series of acquisitions, which are not reflected on the current version of the page. It changed its name in 2015 to Demeter Partners and to Avisa Partners in 2018 after buying Lexfo and Avisa, a Brussels-based public affairs company, whose name it took. The 2009 registration with the EU Transparency Register is explained by the fact that the Register was created in its current form in 2008 and included the Brussels-based Avisa before it was acquired by the subject of the article.

Further acquisitions backed by multiple independent sources in French and English, that are nonetheless absent from this article include the Compagnie Européenne d’Intelligence Stratégique in 2020, the Observatoire des pays arabes and 35° Nord in 2021, and Leakid and Databack in 2022 – all present on the French version of the page.[8][9][10][11][12]

To your point about fake news being at the core of the business, these acquisitions back up my proposed lede. The company’s operations in multiple fields and capacities are very well documented,[13][14] I don’t see why the recent revelations about ghostwriting should completely take over the whole page. An easy way to test this is to ask yourself if there are enough sources to make the company notable before the recent wave of revelations. And there definitely are.

Similarly, I suggest expanding the section with the acquisitions of the group etc.

PraiseVivec (talk) 17:08, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Creation date

The 2009 registration with the EU Transparency Register is explained by the fact that the Register was created in its current form in 2008 and included the Brussels-based Avisa before it was acquired by the subject of the article. The argument seems to be that we should consider Avisa to be different from iStrat/Avisa Partners. Do we have any sources stating that Avisa was created in 2009 and that the statement in the EU Transparency Register is false in the sense that Avisa is not strictly the same organisation as Avisa Partners?

(I don't understand the relevance of 2008, because if the Register was created and frozen in 2008, then it wouldn't have known that Avisa/Avisa Partners was going to be created in 2009.)

While the EU Transparency Register is information entered by the organisation itself, it counts as more of an official action than publishing information about itself on a website, so the organisation has higher legal risks in making easily disproved statements; this is why this seems to me to be a better source than media just quoting what the organisation says about itself on websites.

Until we have sources clarifying this, then the only option I see is to WP:NPOV this: we'll have the date of 2009 according to the EU Transparency Register and 2010 according to some other sources. We cannot (yet) say something that Avisa Partners is a successor to "Avisa, created in 2009", when the source says that Avisa Partners was created in 2009. Boud (talk) 18:05, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

The Jeune Afrique source has significant info on the creation date, in the sense of the evolution to the name Avisa Partners, so while working through the Growth sources, I've also started updating the creation date. This is not meant to override explanations waiting to be resolved here (sources claiming that Avisa/Avisa Partners was not created in 2009, despite the EU Transparency Register). Boud (talk) 20:48, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for your research, the page is slowly shaping up. Had some time on my hands yesterday evening and today to do some more research and the results of that can be found below.

I found a number of sources from 2010 as well as from 2022 stating the year the company was created in: 2010 for iStrat (1, 2, 3), 2018 for Avisa Partners (4, 5, 6). As the sources explain, Demeter (ex-iStrat) bought Brussels-based Avisa in 2018, illustrating that Avisa Partners is a successor to the Brussels-based entity with the same name.

I also found relevant sources showing Avisa Partners completed the acquisition of 35°Nord and will update the article accordingly (7, 8, 9).

The Transparency Register entry from 2008 refers to the original Brussels-based entity, whose existence effectively predates that of iStrat. As far as I can tell, iStrat itself was never registered on the EU Transparency Register. If you have found different information on credible, independent sources, please share. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:13, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Here's what I see in the sources that you find (in fact, one was an existing source):

• "Challenges_Avisa_created2010" - Créée en 2010, l'entreprise est majoritairement détenue - this seems more like a "everyone says it was created in 2010, so we will say that too" statement by the source; but that's a matter of interpretation;
• "Rue89_rightwing_web_vs_Hollande" - Matthieu Creux. Il a pourtant travaillé avec « Didier » et participé au lancement du site en 2010 - this is creation of the website, not creation of the organisation;
• "LeFigaro_AvisaParis_created2010" - Avisa Paris ... Date d'immatriculation : 12/11/2010 - if we accept that Avisa Paris is the same as "Avisa" (when given as a single-word name), then this looks more solid than "LobbyFacts_Avisa"

So Le Figaro seems the strongest source, and putting them together is probably reasonable to override "LobbyFacts_Avisa".

I don't quite follow why you say "The Transparency Register entry from 2008", and why you say that it refers to the original Brussels-based entity. We could use different sids of the Transparency Register. Currently "LobbyFacts_Avisa" is for sid=160606, and states Financial year: Jan 2021 - Dec 2021 at the top, so this is not an "entry from 2008". It very much appears to be an entry from 2022.

The oldest entry that I can find is sid=4619 from 2012, which says Financial year: Oct 2010 - Sep 2011 ... Avisa Partners ... First registered on 07 May 2009. As I understand, the organisation itself is responsible for updating the data, but the record is an official record, so the organisation subjects itself to strong legal risks if it knowingly makes false statements on that record. Are you suggesting that whichever employee happened to update the database in 2012, or provide the initial entry in 2008, made the error? I don't understand where you source this information to. Boud (talk) 21:27, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Growth

I've included what I could from 4 of those 5 sources. I couldn't find anything new to add from "Politico_influence_buying_spree", the second of the five references: what sentences in the source have information missing from our Wikipedia article?

Jeune Afrique had information on Avisa Partners' relation with the DGSE, so I created a separate section for that, because that's a separate theme to the organisation's main activities. Boud (talk) 20:48, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Regarding and Leakid and Databack in 2022 – all present on the French version of the page.[8][9][10][11][12]. None of these five sources have information about Avisa Partners buying Leakid and Databack. This is only the talk page, so this error doesn't matter much, of course, but this is to clarify for people reading the thread who may otherwise become confused. Boud (talk) 21:01, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Activities

"The company's operations in multiple fields and capacities are very well documented,[13][14]"

I looked at the sources, but "very well documented" seems a bit too strong, to put it diplomatically. These seem mostly based on interviews with Avisa Partners leaders, so they don't quite count as in-depth investigative journalism. The first one, in Le Monde has not even been edited properly, suggesting a rather limited process of editorial oversight, with the typos aisni for wikt:fr:ainsi and prcoédé for wikt:fr:procédé. Nevertheless, I tried to get out what I could.

These two sources refer to very recent - 2022 - activity, so I don't quite see how this will help for the other 6 points, but let's sort out one sub-point at a time. If someone sees other notable content in these two, or other sources, then please extend the existing activity sections, or make justified changes based on the sources. It would be good to comment here. Boud (talk) 22:07, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Activities - Point 2

Point 2 by PraiseVivec seems half to be about the lead (point 1) and half about adding more reliably sourced material about the organisation's activities. So I'll quote the relevant sentences from point 2 by PraiseVivec from above:

Moreover, the extract from the EU Transparency Register describes Avisa as a

"public affairs consultancy, which focuses on certain clearly identified policy issues in which we claim real expertise: competition, trade, regulatory affairs (e.g. digital and media, energy, environment, telecommunications, financial services and corporate social responsibility), online advocacy and cyber-security." Similar wording is used in the following sources [2][3][4][5][6][7], that describe the scope of Avisa’s activities, The French version of the article, as well as the version I drafted yesterday use the labels found in these sources.

As such, I suggest expanding the section accordingly to respect WP:DUE, as the information above is adapted from trustworthy sources.

There are several sources here, so let's see if they give information on the organisation's activities that is independent from that provided by the organisation itself. Even self-info can be attributed, but given lower weight than independently investigated information. Boud (talk) 23:19, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Avisa Partners' own description of what it claims to do should be taken into account, but rather sceptically, given that the organisation is talking about itself, and given that the organisation has been active in disinformation.

• [2] Mediapart – only says entreprise française spécialisée en intelligence économique et en cybersécurité; we already have a cybersecurity section; we could add an economic intelligence section, but this source says no details at all about what that means for this organisation;
• [3] "Marianne_behind_Avisa_Partners" – only says la firme d'intelligence économique et de cybersécurité française Avisa Partners, as for [2]
• [4] France 24 – is a video source, with an abstract that implies that Avisa Partners is a major organisation involved in French intelligence économique; the video is an interview with Creux, so it's not really an independent investigation into what Avisa does in reality
• [5] L'Express – says groupe d'intelligence économique Avisa Partners
• [6] Les Echos – says Le spécialiste en intelligence économique et cybersécurité
• [7] "JeuneAfrique_Avisa_possible_buyer_35degNord" – says that Avisa is a société spécialisée dans l'intelligence stratégique

For terminology: fr:Intelligence économique is associated with competitive intelligence, though both articles are tagged with concerns. However, adopting "competitive intelligence" in English would seem to be the most reasonable, while waiting for people working on those articles to sort them out.

I couldn't find any info in any of these sources giving any depth to say what Avisa Partners has actually done in terms of competitive intelligence. I don't see how this fits into any of the existing sections, so I've created a new brief section. Re-use of two existing sources seems adequate given the lack of depth. I didn't see how I could make the section any deeper - the sources (apart from Avisa's own claims about what it does) say essentially nothing apart from the expression "intelligence économique" itself. I did include Avisa's description of what it does, even though it feels like it's advertising for the organisation, in quotes.

I shifted the conference organising section to a subsection of cybersecurity and copyright, since we're starting to get rather many sections. Boud (talk) 00:55, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of the high numbers of sections the article currently has. For ease of reading, I propose reorganizing all the company’s activities under one section, called, well, “Activities”.

I will move the description of the company’s specializations under “lobbying” as they’re taken from the EU Transparency Register and they belong in the corresponding section. I will also tweak the wording for the amount of money declared in the Transparency Register: companies do not list their expenses, but their “estimated total annual revenue generated attributable to activities covered by the Register”(10).

For the “conference organising” section, I’ll include a link to the official website of the Forum, which mentions the event is organised by Avisa Partners.

To your wider point about the company’s activities, I have found an assortment of top-tier French sources published since at least 2018 describing Avisa Partners as an international intelligence economique (11) company, with arms dedicated to cybersecurity, public affairs, investigations. These mentions are included both in archival content and in the recent articles on Mediapart, Marianne, etc which sounds to me that the existence and activities of these units has not been disputed. If you find sources that argue otherwise, please share on the talk page. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:13, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

The existence and activities may not be disputed, but without in-depth coverage, their notability is low.

Regarding your wish to put the organisation's best, in-depth-sourced activities, under a separate h2-level section header, Controversies, I think that given the current sources that we have, that should better wait until we have the actual text and sources (a link to a privacy-violating search engine that gives different results to different users is only a hint, it's not an actual source). If necessary, after that, we might have to start a semi-formal support/oppose section regarding whether or not to shift the fake-news production out of the Activities section, and wait for other people than us two to add arguments for/against. (I started a section like this for the infobox.) The point is to have one very specific editorial question so that lurkers can give support/oppose summaries and arguments, i.e. !votes. It could be an RfC if not enough editors participate, keeping in mind the WP:RFC guidelines. But I think that we should see how far we can converge before going to an RfC. After we see your specific sources, this should become clearer. Boud (talk) 22:14, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Possible secondary sources

Mention here of two libel suits: https://www.01net.com/actualites/des-operations-dintox-sur-le-web-francais-devoilees-par-mediapart.html

doesn’t look like a source. Might get somewhere googling the people who are suing though. Site itself judged not reliable for downloads Elinruby (talk) 07:29, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

(RS due diligence not yet done for this site) do not use, clickbait at best. Elinruby (talk) 05:51, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Libération - reliable, biased? [3] Elinruby (talk) 05:56, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

We currently have this as "Libe_Olivia_Gregoire_iStrat". Most sources are biased; the point is that the bias is known and that we get sources with a variety of biases. But Libération and Le Monde are French media newspapers of record, which is presumably why they're not listed at fr:Wikipédia:Observatoire_des_sources: they have fact-checking and editorial oversight, so that despite the empirically known systemic problems of mainstream Western corporate media, these generally remain the best available to Wikipedia for many types of information. Nobody has seriously disputed them as sources on fr.Wikipedia. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Original story is paywalled ]https://www.mediapart.fr/journal/france/270622/operation-intox-une-societe-francaise-au-service-des-dictateurs-et-du-cac-40] Elinruby (talk) 05:58, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

We have this as "Mediapart_serving_dictators_and_CAC40". Mostly paywalled, but the title and first part are public. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Unfamiliar with source, but A propos page indicates it may qualify as a reliable source: [4] Elinruby (talk) 06:07, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Arrêt sur images - fairly well known, not listed at fr:Wikipédia:Observatoire_des_sources, so apparently not disputed as an RS there. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

This story is cited several times. [5] Also unfamiliar with this source, but it says it is a paper publication and therefore it is not a blog. Quick look did not reveal an editorial policy. Will do some due diligence on this and other sources I find (Libération has been around a really long time though) Elinruby (talk) 06:15, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

fr.wiki article says it is a left-wing activist publication. Treats it as a serious publication. My unfamiliarity was probably due to its origin as a regional paper.Elinruby (talk) 08:15, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

We have this as "Fakir_me_ghost_journalist". Yes, again, known bias, not disputed at fr:Wikipédia:Observatoire_des_sources as a RS. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Le Monde: gold-standard source [6] Elinruby (talk) 06:18, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Yes, it's a newspaper of record, like Libération and Le Figaro, even though, as stated above, some articles have not gone through basic editorial oversight: two annoying typos in a 4-paragraph article makes the reader wonder if the semantic content, not just the spelling, was checked. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

reliability of publication needs to be checked but apparently the climate change policies of Gabon came up — this is a detailed government rebuttal. May provide google fodder if nothing else Elinruby (talk) 06:25, 3 August 2022 (UTC) Here’s the story they are replying to Elinruby (talk) 06:30, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Gabon Review has a published editorial policy. Still looking at La Libreville Elinruby (talk) 08:39, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Médiapart: published editorial policy and staff box. Paywall. [7] Elinruby (talk) 06:36, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Reflets: also paywalled, ownership unclear, says “On retrouve des financiers idéologues des pires errements de l’extrême-droite française, bien au-delà du Rassemblement National. Même s'ils nient à la fois leurs activités de «black SEO» et leurs amitiés très extrême-droitières, les dirigeants d’Avisa sont confondus par les faits” [8] Elinruby (talk) 06:45, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

published editorial policy. Owners named but name is difficult to google Elinruby (talk) 08:26, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Google fodder: informative twitter thread by journalist [9]

France24 is a government channel. Interview with founder [10] Elinruby (talk) 06:54, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Avisa denial [11] -will need to scroll down a bit

sample work product [12] - Scroll down to credits Elinruby (talk) 07:01, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

US clients on OpenSecrets [13] Elinruby (talk) 07:10, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Yes, we have this as "OpenSecrets_lobbying_firm_Avisa", by OpenSecrets. Boud (talk) 14:27, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Also interesting: [14] - unfamiliar with publication, news agency looks highly reliable though Elinruby (talk) 07:22, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Databack and Leakid

Not finding a webpage for Databack. All top hits are for an Android app. No mention of Avisa on Leakid About page. Not drawing any conclusions at the moment and possibly just tired. Elinruby (talk) 10:37, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Links:

• Most likely databack.fr - doesn't seem to be eager for transparency, XXIst century style, in terms of mentioning ownership by Avisa Partners.

• Seems like LeakID mostly seems to be active in giving out illegitimate DMCA takedown notices and working for Microsoft, i.e. in scaring people: "The carpet bombing requests that takedown anything and everything have not been posted at Chilling Effects. Instead, only the account holders being hit with a takedown get to see these scattergun notices. However, one of these super-vague takedowns has been posted online ..." (link added by me), rather than contributing constructively to the copyright debate. The About us page again doesn't seem to be eager for transparency, XXIst century style, in terms of mentioning ownership by Avisa Partners.

I guess the horse and buggies haven't yet had enough time to get from the two organisations' headquarters to the printing presses of their About us pages. Two months is a very short time to get from somewhere in France to somewhere else in France. In any case, I have just inserted the "growth" sentence on Databack and LeakID that I forgot to add, since it was given by PraiseVivec in the activities paragraph rather than the growth paragraph, so I had forgotten it. Boud (talk) 15:15, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Les Échos

Owned by LVMH, whose CEO, Bernard Arnault, was allegedly a client of Avisa. Possibly not an independent secondary source Elinruby (talk) 10:44, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Good find! A big fraction of sources are from Les Echos (France): The newspaper ... in 1988, and was sold to the French luxury goods conglomerate LVMH in November 2007.[6][7][8] So we do need to take this into account in terms of how independent the sources are. Boud (talk) 13:24, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Forum International de la Cybersécurité) 2022

Googling this turns up an organization called MSAB which claims to organize it. Avisa is included in a long list of “partners” Elinruby (talk) 11:50, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Source 5 of fr:Forum international de la cybersécurité (FIC), which is FIC itself, says that CEIS = Compagnie européenne d’intelligence stratégique is a partner, and we currently have two Les Echos (LVMH/Arnault) sources that say that Avisa Partners bought CEIS in 2020 (this is a case where the known ownership filter, one of the five corporate media filters, is unlikely to imply a factual error). So Avisa's role may be exaggerated by the source we have, but it's one of the few sourced activities apart from fake news that the organisation seems to be involved in. I copyedited the sentence we have; I don't see any point in adding an extra source. Boud (talk) 14:46, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Nod, just passing on a finding. Avisa itself is also listed on the program, but as a partner not an organizer. Minor discrepancy but it’s in an article I am fact-checking. I wasn’t advocating any particular course of action. But I am willing to bet that those are separate entities when it comes to taxes Elinruby (talk) 17:19, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Definite vs conditional language

(point 5 from above by PraiseVivec, copy/pasted to allow modular discussion Boud (talk) 16:05, 3 August 2022 (UTC))

5. The Mediapart investigations use conditional language to describe Avisa’s activities, while the Wikipedia article does not

“It is a story that, potentially, involves the widespread contamination of online information”

“The economic intelligence company Avisa Partners […] already stands accused of manipulating information on participative forums on French and foreign media, including Mediapart, as we reported in June […] Now the same firm is also suspected of having successfully infiltrated the online collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia. The reported aim is to change pages to secretly promote its clients or denigrate competitors”

It seems weird to me that an investigative journalism article uses language that is more nuanced than a Wikipedia article.

PraiseVivec (talk) 17:08, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

The title of the Mediapart source used in the Mediapart section is Une enquête de Mediapart raconte l'une des plus grandes entreprises de manipulation de l'information intervenue en France ces dernières années ... Avisa Partners. That is not at all conditional. Mediapart asserts that Avisa Partners is one of the biggest manipulators of opinion in France in recent years. The title of the Marianne source says Derrière les faux blogueurs d'Avisa Partners, i.e. it says outright that Avisa Partners has false bloggers, without any nuance.

Our wording should be appropriate for the strength of our sources and their independence from the subject. If we chose to say that Avisa Partners apparently is involved in competitive intelligence and that it is allegedly involved in cybersecurity and copyright, then that would reflect the superficiality of the level of information in the sources, but that would be less justified for the more in-depth information.

In any case, if you see some changes of wording that are justified by the sources, then please do them or propose them in this section, in a way that there's a likely chance of consensus. If you check the editing history of the article, you'll see that there are people keeping an eye on the article, and fixing what they see needs fixing, e.g. here and here, so even though I'm currently doing most of the editing, others will intervene if they see a need to.

PS: For the purposes of convergent discussion, please state which specific source you are using if it's not clear: we have several different Mediapart sources. Place {{talk-reflist}} at the bottom of the section if you wish to use full references in a talk page section. Boud (talk) 16:05, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

This one is a hornet’s nest, and I’ll need more time and, ideally, the help of other editors familiar with the French context. That being said, I don’t agree that WP:DUE should be interpreted as saying that only the title of the articles is valid, and that the body of the story should not be given any weight. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:13, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

I agree that the body of the articles has weight too, but most of us (me anyway) do not have access to the subscription-only content. What can be done for someone with subscription access is to include the most relevant excerpts, briefly enough to be acceptable under copyright rules, as a |quote=bla bla parameter in the reference. They can also be quoted, short enough (e.g. a few sentences) within copyright constraints, on the talk page, but they can become harder to find by people looking through the article itself and not wanting to search through talk page archives. I think it would be best to include the original French, or both the original + a translation, because otherwise it would be too difficult for someone trying to match the source to the quote. Boud (talk) 21:34, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

Lead: Point 1

(text by PraiseVivec copied from above for convenience Boud (talk) 22:25, 3 August 2022 (UTC))

1. “Avisa Partners or Maelstrom Media or iStrat”

The inaccuracies in this article begin from the name of the company in the lede, which is plainly inaccurate. However, I’m not inclined to criticize anyone too harshly for this, as there is a certain amount of confusion here, as Mediapart explains. Maelstrom Media is in fact a subcontractor of Avisa Partners, while iStrat is one of the former names of the company. The company changed names a number of times throughout the years, most recently in 2018 when it adopted the name Avisa from an older company it acquired.

“En 2021, ses recherches le mettent sur la piste de Maelstrom Media, un prestataire d’Avisa Partners, entreprise française spécialisée en intelligence économique et en cybersécurité.” [1]

This is one of the places where the French article is much more useful, while the current article only discusses this in passing and uses several names interchangeably to refer to the whole group, as in “based on no research or expertise in the subjects, for iStrat known under an alternative name, Maelstrom Media”.

Based on the sources listed below, I would propose as a WP:NPOV lede of the article:

Avisa Partners is a French consulting group specializing in cybersecurity, economic intelligence, investigations and public relations. Headquartered in Paris, the company is present in seven other countries.

In 2022, the group was mentioned in several journalistic investigations, in particular within the framework of the Uber Files, for having manipulated information on a large scale on numerous online media as well as on Wikipedia.

PraiseVivec (talk) 17:08, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

We generally put alternative names bolded in the lead, though in the case of a complicated merger/succession history, that should be briefly clarified (not excluded); I agree.

Now that sources have been examined for the points regarding the body of the article, updating the lead, as a summary of key points, should now be able to converge among editors interested.

• "cybersecurity" - this is superficially sourced by several sources, no depth
• "economic intelligence" - currently fr:intelligence économique is associated with competitive intelligence, and both articles have problems, and again, the sources only give superficial coverage of what this means apart from a buzzword
• "investigations and public relations" - we currently have nothing at all on this in the content, not even from superficial comments in sources, so it's not valid in a summary
• the exclusion of the best-sourced (by depth and indepenendence of the sources) activity of the organisation from the first sentence is not justified
• the location of the headquarters is not in the body of the article, is currently not sourced, and seems quite a minor point for an organisation that is mostly active online; moreover, we already have "French" to indicate the organisation's sociogeographic location.

Based on these reasons, I've put a proposal in place based on summarising the current state of the sourced content, which especially reflects changes based on sources listed by you (PraiseVivec). The non-fake-news sections have been expanded as much as could be reasonably done based on the sources, so the WP:DUE weight for non-fake-news activities currently remains low: we lack sources for that.

I suggest that edits to the lead be complemented by discussion here in this section, as the body of the articles evolves, and as better sources are published and found. (For example, the creation date issue should first be sorted out based on sources and discussing in Talk:Avisa Partners#Creation date, and then any well-sourced improvements can be used to update the lead.) Boud (talk) 22:25, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

I’m going to reshuffle some of the sentences in the new lede to make for better reading. As mentioned before, Maelstrom Media was described by Mediapart as a subcontractor, not as a subcomponent of Avisa Partners. Unless you can find a credible news article arguing otherwise, I suggest we stick to what can be sourced from multiple media sources.

Most importantly, I would like to remove "disinformation" from the first sentence of the lede and replace it with "online influence" per NPOV, backed by sources. Rather than ”disinformation”, I will add the tag ”information manipulation” later on in the lede, a description which appears much more often among the sources of the initial investigation.

I'm still unconvinced that enough sources refer to their operations as "disinformation" to warrant its inclusion in the lede per WP:DUE: all three sources used to back the claim use the word sparingly and sometimes only indirectly (for example, the company denying being involved in disinformation (12)). I still think "disinformation" is a very strong word that should only be used in Wikipedia's voice if ample evidence for its wide use by RSs exists. The term seems to appear more in tertiary sources editorializing the initial investigation.

Also, there are way too many citations in the lede, but that is probably a good thing until the article reaches a stable form. PraiseVivec (talk) 17:13, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

I tidied up the citations, but I've kept your version essentially unchanged. So it seems like we've reached convergence, at least for the moment, for the lead. For verifiability, it's safer to include very specific inline repeat citations in the lead. Better that they are repeat citations, since a citation that is not needed in the body is, generally, unlikely to be needed in the lead. In this particular case, the sources for non-fake-news activities by Avisa Partners are still very weak, so it's still necessary to have them in the lead, so that readers who are sceptical can check for themselves. Boud (talk) 21:41, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

I'm still in doubt over whether we should include Maelstrom Media in the lede. It seems to me that tier-1 sources such as Mediapart (1) refer to it as a subcontractor, or else don't mention it at all, in which case it should probably not be in the lede and it definitely shouldn't be bolded. Given the uncertainty, I think we should keep Maelstrom for now in the "Julien Fomenta Rosat" section of the article, pending further clarifications from other sources. PraiseVivec (talk) 13:17, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

Infobox: Wikidata vs Wikipedia

To simplify decision-making, the proposal here is to retain the automatic use of Wikidata for the Infobox, using {{Infobox organization/Wikidata}}. This does allow parameters to be included as overrides of the Wikidata parameters. Please present arguments for or against and Support or Oppose. Boud (talk) 22:42, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

• Support (proposer) It seems useful to me to have key, sourced information shared automatically among the different language Wikipedias, and the existence of Wikidata makes it a pity not to benefit from that. What is the objection to having combined cross-wiki verification of key items of information? Non-referenced items on Wikidata are not fetched. Boud (talk) 22:42, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Tokayev and Kazakhstan in the Wikipedia section

The reason I removed Tokayev from the Wikipedia section a few days ago is that none of the cited sources refer to him in connection with Wikipedia. Kazakhstan is already in the Clients section, but I have no qualm with adding Tokayev's name to that bit of the text, since he is mentioned by name in some of the sources (while others seem to say AP's work was mainly with the Kazakh consulate in Strasbourg).(1)

Both Nguesso and large French companies (CAC 40) are specifically mentioned in the Mediapart article in connection with Wikipedia actions. But I'm unable to find any source that would warrant mentions of Tokayev or Kazakhstan in the Wiki section. PraiseVivec (talk) 13:25, 7 August 2022 (UTC)

You're right, at least in terms of what's publicly visible in the sources.  Done Boud (talk) 15:06, 7 August 2022 (UTC)