PR practitioners are poring over the significance of an official announcement from Manchester United warning fans to treat any web pages purporting to be written by United players with extreme scepticism.
The club posted the message on its official website making it clear to fans that none its players maintained a personal profile on any social network.
It also said that any official news relating to the club or its players would be communicated via ManUtd.com.
The underlying message coming out of Old Trafford is the concern about the high number of fake profiles impersonating Manchester United players online.
Some of the club's star players, including Ryan Giggs, Wayne Rooney and Darren Fletcher, are known to have once had genuine accounts on the microblogging site Twitter. However, these have since been closed.
Several leading PR commentators have suggested that the club made the move in a bid to control the disclosure of sensitive information.
But others believe that Manchester United simply issued the warning as part of a general effort to closely manage the reputation of the club online.