Internet chatter
This article has a lot of useful tips–especially concerning tools that people can use to monitor internet chatter about them. All of the tools he names are quite useful, but their are some smear jobs that simply cannot be fixed through simple tools like this. There is a reason professional corporate reputation management companies exist.
http://www.articlealley.com/article_939539_13.html
Unwanted publicity can be like a virus on the Internet. There are firms such as Reputation Hawk that specialize in cleaning it up.