Vingroup Launches Unprecedented Legal Campaign Against Online Disinformation

Vietnam’s largest conglomerate, Vingroup, has taken the unprecedented step of filing lawsuits against 68 individuals and organizations, alleging a coordinated campaign to spread false information about the company and its leadership.

Why is this story in CleanTechnica? Vingroup owns VinFast, whose ambitions in the US are temporarily sidetracked by many external factors. According to sources inside the company, the legal cases were filed mostly against Vietnamese influencers, but also went international.

The legal action targets what the company calls a torrent of fabricated content across TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube that has damaged its reputation. Vingroup Deputy Chairman and CEO Nguyen Viet Quang said the misinformation campaign targeted multiple aspects of the business, from Vingroup’s financial stability to VinFast’s product origins and some of the executives’ personal lives.

The lawsuits detail specific rumors that have circulated online, including allegations that Vingroup was nearing bankruptcy with VND800 trillion (approximately $30.29 billion) in debt. The company has publicly disputed this figure, stating its actual borrowings total closer to VND283 trillion (aproximately $10.725 billion) — a level it characterizes as “very safe” by both international and domestic standards.

Another major point of contention involves the origin of Vingroup’s VinFast electric vehicles, which is also the bulk of the cases filed, according to our source.

The company says it has been targeted by rumors claiming its cars are merely “Chinese products disguised” as Vietnamese. This is, of course, a complete and massive lie. Vingroup built a plant in HaiPhong in record time, and VinFast has mastered the entire production chain and maintains a 60% localization rate in its manufacturing processes. In fact, CleanTechnica has toured that factory. Moreover, the now electric car maker, originally began producing ICE vehicles exclusively for the home market with a partnership with BMW and was the first car maker in the world to declare it would completely stop its production of ICE vehicles, maintain a service and parts facility for all these cars, and shift to making only EVs.

Beyond domestic courts, Vingroup is pursuing an aggressive international approach. The company plans to work with foreign lawyers to file cases in countries where the accused individuals reside. It also intends to notify relevant foreign embassies in Vietnam and Vietnamese embassies abroad, framing the online attacks as violations of Vietnam’s Cybersecurity Law and Penal Code.

Much of the libelous content, appearing on TikTok and YouTube, seemed to have been “orchestrated” according to a source in VinGroup, but that has to be proven in court. What is certain is that a number of these videos have been taken down.

Vingroup’s aggressive legal strategy signals a significant shift in how major corporations address online disinformation. While companies have long battled rumors, the decision by billionaire Pham Nhat Vuong’s conglomerate to pursue dozens of cases simultaneously across multiple jurisdictions highlights the growing challenge of controlling corporate narratives in the social media age.

Vingroup started with Vinpearl, a resort developer and one the founding arms of the conglomerate. Other companies include Vinhomes, which is in residential real estate development, and VinWonders, which runs amusement parks and attractions. Then there is VinBus, an operator (not manufacturer) of electric buses. There is also Vinmec, which owns several hospitals, and Vinfa for pharmaceuticals. It runs VinSchool for K–12 education and VinUniversity, which operates in partnership with Cornell University and the University of Pennsylvania. They are also into technology, with VinID in fintech and VinAI for artificial intelligence research.

What legal experts in the Philippines familiar with ASEAN businesses told CleanTechnica is that this move by Vingroup represents one of the most comprehensive legal responses to online misinformation by a Vietnamese corporation, potentially setting a precedent for how businesses in the region combat digital defamation campaigns. The region is known for its lax monitoring of defamatory content, which is usually handled simply by taking down posts.

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