This article is more than 1 year old

Dodgy executives ‘four times more likely online’

The old ones are the worst, apparently

The dotcom world is run by a bunch of crooks, according to research from Kroll Associates, a corporate security company. The company found that Internet executives were four times as likely to have "unsavoury backgrounds" than executives from traditional companies.

The FT reports that over the last six months Kroll carried out 70 checks on online executives and board members, of which around 39 per cent had problems such as undisclosed bankruptcies, violations of Securities and Exchange Commission rules, and even links to organised crime.

Typically the company would expect to find a problem rate of about one in ten.

Ernie Brod, an executive MD at Kroll's New York office said that one of the most extreme cases involved the murder of two potential investors, who turned out to have links to penny stocks promotional scams and organised crime.

But the Martha Lane-Foxes of this world need not fear the finger of suspicion. Brod said that the problem lay not the younger management teams, but with the "grey beards" brought in to add stature to a company. He said that many dotcom management teams were too young to have "much of an unsavoury background - or any kind of background."

Concerned by the news, we at El Register are launching an immediate investigation into the credentials of our management team. None of them could be classed as spring chickens, and frankly we are quite worried about that Magee character. And as for that Thomas geezer, he actually owns a grey beard. ®

Related Story

Young blood pushing out Intel old blood

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like