Op4G / Slice fabricated survey data is a public example that got attention from everyone, but there are many more hidden cases. I have two stories that I always bear in mind:
The first one was early in my insights career.
We hired a junior researcher and the person told me that in their previous company, which at that time was one of the leading research companies in the country, they were doing phone research (CATI) and they had a specific older audience to recruit. The owner of the agency told the person to send the surveys to her friends, which obviously don't fit the criteria. If they were so relaxed with a new junior researcher, what were they doing behind closed doors? To make it worse, that same owner was the representative of a big international market research association.
The second example I keep seeing frequently.
A "specialist" B2B recruitment market research company sends me a cold outreach email with full screener criteria (which I don't fit) and then a survey where I can pass with the same criteria they provided in the email. And I can get X dollars on a gift card immediately. And of course, their website and socials are full of their data quality practices and pledges they make. They even lead on one pledge. This is also so public that anyone can figure it out. So I'm not sure how they keep doing it for years.
What other stories are out there? 🚶🏼