Category: Uncategorized

Workmans’ Compensation Claims and Social Media

Next to surveillance, social media discovery has been the Investigator’s best method for disproving workman’s compensation claims. Because fraud is so prevalent in these cases, insurance companies make it a point of investigating claims. The National Insurance Crime Bureau reports an estimated $7.2 billion in annual costs towards workers’ compensation fraud, making it an expensive problem for insurance companies.

It helps to first understand the types of fraud insurance companies investigate.

3 Types of Workmans’ Comp Fraud

Claims Journal describes three types of Workmans’ Comp insurance fraud:

Policy-Related Fraud: Policy-related fraud occurs when a company intentionally manipulates or withholds information from its insurance company in an attempt to lower its premium payment. For example, it is fraudulent for a business to inaccurately report the size of its workforce, misclassify employees or re-emerge as a new company on paper in an attempt to obtain a lower experience modification factor rating—a factor that adjusts the premium based on claims history.


Claim-Related Fraud: Claim-related fraud typically occurs when an employee falsely claims a work-related injury or illness in an attempt to gain a workers’ compensation insurance benefit. This type of fraud can be committed if an employee is injured outside of the workplace, but claims the injury occurred at work. It can also happen if an employee exaggerates the severity of an injury in order to receive a greater benefit.


Medical Provider Fraud: Medical provider fraud is committed when a medical provider deliberately attempts to profit off the workers’ compensation system by unnecessarily performing services on a claimant solely to collect an insurance payment. Fraudulent billing and kickback schemes with pharmacies or medical specialists are other examples.

Claim Related Fraud

This is the most common fraud case that most investigators are hired for. We have conducted hundreds of deep web scans on individuals who are suspected of fraud. Many times we identify contradictory photos posted in social media. For example, a claimant has back related issues, but can be seen in a social media post water skiing.

If attorneys are involved, many times the claimant is advised to be careful what they post in social media. They may be instructed to tell their family and friends not to tag them in any photos. The set their privacy settings high.

In fact, there is even software out now that can help attorneys monitor their client’s social media accounts for them. It is called Private Footprint. They describe their software as, “Client Social Media Monitoring for Personal Injury and Disability Lawyers”. It is an interesting approach and I wonder how many attorneys are using it.

In any case, it makes it more difficult for the investigator. We can always tell when a person has been advised to lock down their social media. Even so, there are times when photos are out there on friends and family members social media that the claimant does not remember.

In the end, people over share in social media. This can be a key factor in gathering evidence in a case and it is always worth it to check. You never know what you will find until you look.

Finding People on OnlyFans

OnlyFans has exploded in popularity during the Covid pandemic. It has been an outlet for people to kill a little boredom, the same way many social platforms have done. This gives all of us a plethora of additional information to find on a POI (person of interest). Finding people on OnlyFans can be tricky. We will share some tips that we have found help during our searches.

Key OnlyFans Statistics for 2022

  • OnlyFans has 170 million users
  • Every day 500,000 people join OnlyFans
  • OnlyFans has 1.5 million content creators
  • The top OnlyFans creators make $100,000 a month
  • The average OnlyFans creator makes $151 per month
  • The average creator on OnlyFans has 21 subscribers
  • OnlyFans has paid more than $2 billion to its creators so far

What is it all about?

According to their website, “OnlyFans is the social platform revolutionizing creator and fan connections. The site is inclusive of artists and content creators from all genres and allows them to monetize their content while developing authentic relationships with their fanbase.” They pride themselves on being welcoming of all creative genres and content. ( hint…hint…. lines are blurred between Influencers, pornography, and sex workers). Like any site like this, it has the potential of a huge amount of earnings. OnlyFans reports over 50 million monthly users and 1 million content creators on the platform. 

Searching on the Site:

Finding people on OnlyFans can be challenging if they don’t cross reference their profile on other social sites or websites. One of my very favorite ways to search in social media is to use Google and searching Only Fans is no different. Here is a quick cheat sheet to use:

  1. Open your browser and go to the search bar
  2. Type in “onlyfans.com/insert username here”
  3. Continue to use various usernames you know belong to your subject

If this doesn’t work, try another way:

  1. Open your browser and go to the search bar
  2. Type in “search:onlyfans.com *insert username or name here*”
  3. Continue to use various usernames you know belong to your subject

Many times people who have profiles on Only Fans, cross reference on their other social media platforms ( especially Instagram ). Be sure to comb through sites to see if you can find anything there as well.

I would try the above methods using all search engines, not just Google. You never know what another search engine might pick up. It is worth the extra time it takes.

Can You Screenshot in Only Fans?

You can take a screenshot in Only Fans without the creator knowing about it. Since it is a web-based service, it has no means of identifying whether a screenshot has been taken.

Search Engine Tool

There is a tool for searching OnlyFans, but like anything else, it can be hit or miss. It is worth it to try however. It is called, “httpss://onlysearch.co/”

The site was designed to help OnlyFans influencers connect with their fans. So it does index publicly available information, display picture, display name, bio, price, and location — and display this information on OnlySearch, when key search terms appear in bios. 

As of this writing, the above methods are the quickest ways to conduct a search on this site.

Adults Contacting Minors Online

Adults contacting minors online for the purpose of sextortion or meeting up for sex continues to be a big problem. Federal investigators believe there are more than 500,000 online predators active each day and they all have multiple online profiles. The ACM’s (Adults Contacting Minors) attempt to groom their minor victims, one step at a time.  They start by making a connection. Next, they spark conversation, and then try to lure them in by sending a provocative photo of themselves. For most, the end goal is to meet for sex. In some cases, they are satisfied by either video chats or even exchanging of photos. More than 50% of victims are ages 12 to 15 and 89% of victims are contacted by a predator through a chatroom and instant messaging.

Most ACM’s have a level of confidence in this because currently it Is underreported. There is a sense that the ACM is “anonymous” online with no way to find out who he really is. This makes it almost impossible to catch them. With the help of great organizations like SOSA (Safe From Online Sex Abuse), whose goal it is to raise awareness and combat abuse, they are making some headway.

Recently the organization created a documentary on this subject that every parent should watch. It is called Undercover/Underage.  Roo Powell is on a mission to expose the dangers of and prevent online child sex abuse. She works together with her nonprofit group, SOSA to set up aliases to engage with child predators.  She works with law enforcement and professionals in the field. Over the course of the documentary, Roo transforms herself into several 15–16-year-old personas. It is no easy undertaking to make 30-year old’s look (Roo) and act like a 15-year-old minor. However, she pulls it off. She has done her research and understands the behavior, likes/dislikes of an average teen.

Alias Creation (aka Sock Puppets)

  1. Setting up and creating a fake profile requires a lot of upfront work. Because this may lead to a video meeting or even an in-person meeting, everything must jive. Using the same username is critical across all platforms.
  2. Creating a community of “friends” to make the profile look believable.
  3. Photos – hiring a professional photographer who specializes in photo editing. The photographer in the documentary works in the fashion industry and is great at identifying and removing any age regressing features. The goal is to make her look like a teenager.
  4. The use of hashtags is very important. Teens will use hashtags – #freshman, #15yearsold, #mixedgirl, #daddyissue, etc. The more the better to get the right kind of attention online.

OSINT Work

One thing that I found to be interesting as I watched the documentary, is how the team used OSINT techniques every step of the way. They used the “Leave no stone unturned” strategy to try to ID the guy. In one episode, the ACM loved to talk about himself. He talked about his work history, his hobbies, the fact that he has 4 kids, etc. The team is shown searching all of it to connect the dots and find out information about this guy online. He’s a pro however- he knows what he is doing and is careful. Just one small little crumb could be enough to point them in the right direction. The average person has no idea how much information is housed on the web. It could be an old press release that has been forgotten about that names him. Or it could be an obituary of a deceased relative that includes the name of the ACM. Anything is possible and that is why it is important to take the time needed to search.

The group also uses Honey Pot computing to lure in the ACM. A honeypot is a decoy computer system for trapping hackers or tracking unconventional or new hacking methods. In this case it is being use as a lure to try to identify the ACM’s IP address. For this case, it is being populated with the teen girl persona’s photos, poetry, etc. On the backend of the site there is an activity log. This lists out the visitors of the site. From that IP address, one may be able to identify the location of the ACM, if they do not use a VPN of course.

Keeping Up With the Apps

It makes sense that teens are more inclined to use apps. Apps allow users to share photos and videos with their friends through their mobile device. The documentary mentions a few sites/apps you may not have heard of before.

  • boardgamegeek.com :This site’s database has more than fifty thousand board games along with their developers and players. The games themselves are linked to users through lists called GeekLists, along with owned/played/wanted etc. connections, ratings, reviews, session reports, and so on. It has a forum which has some search capabilities. Good to keep in mind if your subject is a gamer. Search by location and then by name.
  • Online chat groups, Message apps, Gaming apps, make it easy for a predator to make a connection with a minor online. Interactions can easily escalate to “sextortion”, in which minors are coerced into sending explicit imagery of themselves. According to a New York Times recent article titled, “How to Protect Your Children From Online Predators”, the following are the ones to watch closely

In summary, the team uses outstanding critical thinking skills along with online research to try to identify the ACM’s. Some fall through the cracks, but in some cases, she does provide enough evidence to law enforcement to “take it from there”. It is not an easy task, and it really takes a thick skin and a strong stomach. Some scenes show Roo emotionally drained from the experience of playing out conversations with child predators. But in the end, it is her deep desire to help the kids. If she can get one or two arrested, she has done what she set out to do.