Corporate Archives

LinkedIn is the New Facebook: Search Tips

LinkedIn is slowly (over the last few years) turning from a business only platform to more of a sharing platform. While some things are still tabu, more and more users are sharing posts around personal matters than ever before. In fact, LinkedIn just launched its own version of Facebook stories. This will change how you search in LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Stories

LinkedIn, has recently announced the launch of its Stories feature to allow users to share their photos and videos of up to 20 seconds on their accounts. The UAE was actually the first country in the Middle East to try the new feature out. LinkedIn explained that since the Pandemic, more users were using the platform and they noted an increase of 20% of private messaging on the platform. The engagement on posts has tripled. Currently LinkedIn has 4 million active users.

LinkedIn Loopholes for OSINT

Last month, I wrote a blog post, “LinkedIn Loopholes. How to Use Them in Your Search.” As I outlined in that post, LinkedIn got rid of their advanced search option making searching the platform much more difficult to do. It is worth another look however. Especially, due to the recent addition of LinkedIn stories. It remains to be seen just how this will work and what, if any, search options there will be here.

How Does This Help the Private Investigator?

One way is to take a look at the user’s URL. For example purposes, we will use my URL for my Linkedin profile. Anyone can find me by searching for Kathy Doering, however take a look at my URL. If you were investigating me, you may consider using this unique URL to search Google.

A solid LinkedIn profile can uncover all kinds of clues in terms of previous work experience. Some users allow their connections to be public vs. private. This is another plus for the investigator.

Don’t forget to take a look at their interests and who they follow. Groups they are involved with may be of interest as well. If more personalization is where LinkedIn is headed, it will be well worth it to devote some research time here.

Small Business Acquisitions as a Growth Strategy

I remember when 9-11 happened and the tremendous shock that resonated throughout our country. The pain felt for all the lives lost. The fear that an enemy could attack us the way they did. The crash of our economy and the uncertainty of what was ahead. President Bush told America that the stock market was, “on sale” , and it was a great time to invest. At the time, I remember questioning that. However, I now understand it and embrace it.

Fast forward to today and I am feeling a lot of the same feelings. Economically, we must embrace a new normal. Small business owners are now adapting to these changes. I have been watching it across multiple industries and many have surprised me by their creativity. Learning to look at things differently and adapting to change can be very beneficial to the small business owner.

I can’t help but wonder if this is a good time to consider small business buyouts. Would this be a beneficial growth strategy? We hear about this all the time with large corporations, but is it smart at the small business level?

Acquisition of a Small Business

According to McKinsey, “acquisitions as a growth strategy can be used to meet many business goals. A business owner may want to acquire a competitor and consolidate their market. It may also make sense to acquire a new product, which you can then scale. It may be faster and cheaper to acquire a competitor that has better technology, so you don’t have to build the tech yourself. Lastly, you may identify a business that you believe you could grow substantially and turn into a winner. All of these strategies should be on the radar for small business owners who want to grow their companies.”

Identifying a business you believe could grow right now, after we are through this COVID-19 pandemic, may be a smart move for your company.

Do you have a company in mind? Start with a solid plan and investigate. Investigative due diligence refers to the research and analysis of an individual or organization done in preparation for a business transaction. A proper due diligence check list covers corporate filings, finance, operations, management and employee health, just to name a few. This occurs after preliminary discussions have taken place between the parties involved.

Online Background Check

But, sometimes things are not always as they appear to be. Conducting a thorough online background check on a business and key owners/executives may either give you the confidence to move ahead or justify a pause to collect more information.

More and more documents are stored online and are open sourced; you only need to know and understand where to look.

I will be writing more on this subject in the weeks to come because I think it is valuable information right now. We are seeing a rise in this type of online research and if you would like to discuss this further, please feel free to reach out.

Online Corporate Protection and Executive Security

Proactive approach to corporate security online.

One thing we know for sure; cyber criminals attack corporate executives. The bigger the company, the higher the stakes. Mid-size companies may also be a target because those executives are time poor & money rich. It is exactly that space that I believe Investigators have their biggest opportunity to grow their business by offering this protection. You may have even had opportunity to conduct this research for a client or two in your own experience. But doing an OSINT sweep once a year may not be enough. I would suggest an ongoing program and will walk you through how to pitch this to your business clients.

Understanding the Treat

Price Waterhouse Cooper (PWC) ‘s recent report, “23rd Annual Global CEO Survey,” reveals that around 80% of CEOs have changed their online behavior due to potential risks. Corporate Espionage is alive and well and needs to be taken seriously as more and more employees overshare in social media. This allows for competitors to gain excellent insight into a vast array of information that would not otherwise be easily obtained. Banning employees from using social media at work has proven to be a nightmare and monitoring their social media internally has major privacy concerns. However, when approached correctly this type of monitoring is very valuable to any business regardless of their size.

The Challenge of Balance

What makes this tricky, is that the company still has the responsibility to keep their employees safe, protect assets and data, mitigate risk for threats of fraud and monitoring reputation. High level executives travel to areas of the world that do not share the same security measures we do in the United States. All of this coupled with cyber security risks and you have a recipe for a potential disaster. In the photo below through the software we use, a Global Awareness search allows us to see natural disasters (i.e. earthquakes, fires, hurricanes,) as well as public security incidents’ in real time. A company’s HR team may wish to set a global awareness query around the area of travel and within the appropriate time frame. Real time alerts are set in place for immediate notification of potential risk.

In a nutshell, there are proactive steps that can be put in motion to ensure the safety of everyone.

There is a Rumor Going Around…

In any work environment there is bound to be a whole bunch of dynamics around the office. Too many type A’s in the office could be quite exhausting for example. It takes skill to navigate it all with the help of a good HR department. This is however, very understandable and common to most people.

But what happens when things turn ugly at work? What if someone has it in for a person or even a group of people? Workplace conflict is a very real issue and one that should not be taken lightly. With the mental health issues we currently have in our country, employees should be trained in what to look for and have a safe place in which they can voice their concerns. In fact, many work places are taking a proactive approach by conducting workshops on this topic to teach employees what is acceptable and what isn’t.

Workplace Policy

Developing a workplace policy like the one below is helpful and can be especially important should any legal issues come up.

Under federal law and Department of Labor (DOL) policy, harassment by DOL employees of DOL employees based on race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity and pregnancy), national origin, age, disability, genetic information, sexual orientation, or parental status is prohibited. The Department of Labor does not permit harassing conduct by anyone in the workplace, including contractors.
Taken from the DOL website

Posting it in the lunch room or in a public area would be a great first step. But it does take much more effort on the part of management and prevention is key. Years ago, when a company had a problem within their organization, it pretty much stayed there. Not true anymore, thanks to social media.

Social Media’s Role

What is social media’s role in all of this? Does an employer have the right to monitor employees social media? Can it be cause for dismissal? More and more the answer is yes because it can be a red flag alert that will stop a publicity nightmare down the road.

Where there is smoke there is fire. Social media can be a red flag to other things that may be happening within a department. This was true of a Seattle Officer who showed signs of of violent tendencies on and off social media.

The Seattle Officer lost his job over a collection of social media posts. The post became public by placing a blurb about it on the Office of Police Accountability’s website. The officer included some pretty rough comments about illegal immigration, with an emphasis on endorsing violence. The department issued this statement:

“The department’s ability to fulfill its public safety duties depends on communities believing that officers will treat them equally and with dignity, regardless of their immigration status,” Best concluded. “Your comments suggest that you will not do so. They could have substantial negative consequences to the relationship between members of the Department and those that we serve and showed exceeding poor judgment.”

Additionally, the officer was suspended for escalating another incident to the point where a fellow officer feared for their safety.

As an employee, would you feel more safe knowing your employer was being proactive? When does safety in the workplace trump privacy? Please share your thoughts…

Secrets About Social Media Monitoring That Nobody Will Tell You.

By now most people have heard of social media monitoring in one form or another. Social media monitoring is something that companies do in order to maintain a good online presence and to monitor their online reputation. Restaurants, retail stores, doctors, lawyers and more are smart to hire a company to conduct this ongoing research on their behalf. It can reveal a lot about the company and its competitors.

In the investigation world, social media monitoring can take on an entirely new dimension. If you advertise that you conduct social media investigations, this added service could be a great new source of revenue for your company. A recent case study provides a good example of what we are talking about.

An investigator’s client (who is an attorney) was interested in locating an individual involved in a case she was working on. She wanted the individual’s social media watched for updates, as he was not able to be found using traditional surveillance methods. The investigator needed social media monitoring in order to watch for location clues in as close to real time as possible.

In the social media/ online world, things can change in a second. What is sometimes here today, will be gone tomorrow. That is where monitoring comes in. When an investigator uses social media monitoring, they are getting updates in real time. This type of online surveillance can be handy as it allows the investigator to get a clear picture and an update day to day on the whereabouts of his poi. This allows an investigator to act “in the moment” to better target resources to serve the person as needed, or to even find a missing person.

While conducting social media monitoring for this investigator we were able to locate the person. Within their instagram stories, we could see that he was on vacation and wanted to share his experiences. Looking at the background of an image can reveal a lot. We could see that he was visiting a very popular tourist destination. With this added information, it allowed the investigator to target more effectively. This may not be true in every case as some people don’t use social media at all. However, they are in the minority.

So next time you think about social media investigation ask yourself this question:

Would it be of value to my client to conduct social media monitoring for this case?
Some examples include:

Jury monitoring before, during and after a high profile case
Locating a missing person
Threat monitoring

The bottom line to all of this is to begin with the purpose & be certain it is well justified and that you are monitoring open source data only. When needed, this is an additional step in your investigation that may save time and money in the long run. People love to share their experiences online and this will never change. Learn ways to use it to your advantage.