Tag: fake instagram

Every Picture Tells a Story

How to Use it in Your Next Investigation

More than 95 million photos are uploaded to Instagram every day,(as of November 2019). People love to look at pictures in social media and they love to share them. Most Instagram photos are uploaded in the moment of experience, right from a mobile phone. This can be very telling when conducting an investigation around a missing person, a criminal, or even someone who you are trying to serve papers to. Paying attention to the details of the photo is especially helpful. Who are they with? What is in the background? Can you tell what the weather is like?

As an added feature, Instagram stories was launched in 2016 and allows users to upload photos and short videos that will disappear in 24 hours. Yes, like the social platform, SnapChat. Timing is everything and that is where continual monitoring of a site comes in handy.

Not only can Instagram be helpful in your online research, it is also a great place to promote your business. For now, let’s dig in deeper in this overlooked platform for the investigation world.

Starting with the name one chooses when creating a profile, users are encouraged to use any combination of numbers, capital letters, lowercase letters and underscores. Usernames cannot exceed 20 characters. So, as you can see knowing your POI’s full name may not be of help unless they use it publicly in their profile. A good rule of thumb is that most people reuse their usernames. Chances are if you know one, you will uncover other platforms with the same username in your search.

There are even username generators online that help new users create an username that “gets them noticed”. Spin xo is just one of many sites.

Spin XO

As you can see, finding a POI’s user name can be a challenge. Once you do some digging, and you find the profile, the following searching sites can be used to make digging in easier:

  1. https://picpanzee.com/
  2. https://www.piwox.com/
  3. https://www.searchmy.bio/

As with every other social media account, marketing dollars are a high priority. In order to get that revenue, the site must show ROI., which includes how may people engage. There are many tools to use for this purpose.

Don’t forget to check Instagram!

Social Media Scams: 2019 Update

It seems the internet will never be completely free of scams, fake ads, and outlandish claims by companies and the products they sell. And 2019 is proving to be no different. Here’s the latest on what to look out for when browsing the web, scrolling your Facebook news feed, and clicking on those enticing ads.

1) Although Facebook has pledged to get tough on scammers, millions of users are still being targeted by fraudsters. Harry Rose, editor of Which? magazine, said: “Facebook has promised to tackle scams head-on so we’re disappointed that it took them a full 24 hours to remove our falsified ad, despite many comments flagging that it was fake.” Facebook and other tech companies urgently need to put systems in place to ensure their millions of users are protected from scams that could see them conned out of substantial sums.” A Facebook spokesman said: “We are taking action to stop fraud wherever it appears, and will continue to adapt to the increasingly sophisticated techniques fraudsters use to con people.

Just remember the old adage, if it seems too good to be true it probably is. And follow these rules:

• If an ad is endorsed by a celebrity, do not assume it is genuine.
• Never use a financial service advertised on social media without checking their background.
• Avoid filling out quizzes or surveys that ask you for personal details. They could be used to commit ID fraud, or target you with follow-up scams.
• Do not click, like or share posts you are unsure of. Opening links or downloading attachments could risk installing a virus on your computer.
• Be wary of unusual messages from friends if they contain links to “too good-to-be-true” offers or ask for money – even if the message has been sent via Facebook Messenger. A change in your friend’s style of writing is also a likely sign that it’s not them. Always contact your friend privately to check.
• Check your privacy settings and limit what is publicly visible. Facebook sets your friends list to “public” by default. So if a scammer creates a convincing copy of your account, it’s easier for them to target people on your friends list. Use Facebook’s privacy settings to change it to private or “friends only” instead.
• If you spot a suspicious post on Facebook, report it. Click on the three dots in the top right hand corner of the post and select “Give feedback”.

2) Because Millennials are constantly on social media, it provides the perfect scenario for scammers and fraudulent activity. Recently, Better Business Bureau Northwest + Pacific has seen a rise of scam activity occurring on Snapchat. The scheme targets young adults with an offer to make money through a “sponsorship” or “advertising opportunity.” They instruct the person to send money via gift cards to pay for “advertising” and then scammers request account login information to get on Snapchat and invite that person’s friends to be part of this “opportunity” and keep the scheme going. The victim’s login information is changed so they cannot login to stop it or warn others, leaving the scammer in control of the account until Snapchat is notified.

BBB has already identified these types of scams happening in Texas, Louisiana, South Carolina and New York. Recently the Police Department in Boise, Idaho reported seeing it as well, with a local victim losing thousands of dollars. Because 71% of Snapchat users are between ages 18-29, it’s easy to see why so many young consumers might fall for it.

Anytime someone asks for your login information and/or payment via gift card, it’s a scam. Block that user, delete the message, and report them.
3) The last scam targets users on the other end of the age spectrum. The “Grandparent Scam” has been around for years, but variations keep popping and duping thousands of consumers every year. In 2018, an estimated $1.48 billion was reported stolen, with those over the age of 70 suffering the highest average losses, according to the Federal Trade Commission.


Typically, the victim receives a frantic phone call from a scammer posing as a grandchild or other family member. The “grandchild” explains that he or she is in some kind of trouble and needs help. The “grandchild” pleads to not to tell his or her parents and asks that they wire thousands of dollars for reasons such as posting bail, repairing a car, covering lawyer’s fees or even paying hospital bills. The caller is counting on an instant reaction from the victim by playing the sympathy card.
What you need to do first is verify the caller. Ask a personal question that only your grandchild or family member would know the answer to. Tell them you’ll call back and ask for a number; then contact your grandchild or another family member to determine whether or not the call is legitimate and confirm the whereabouts of the grandchild.
Never send money through wire transfer or other “sketchy” methods, especially to locations overseas. That is a serious red flag. Scammers also commonly use payment via prepaid card or gift cards.
If you do fall victim to the “Grandparent Scam”, report the incident immediately to the BBB Scam Tracker and local police.

Think Your Data Is Private Because You’re Not on Social Media? Think Again.

Just because you’re not on Facebook or Twitter doesn’t mean your data is safe from social media or their clever algorithms. In two different studies, researchers found evidence that your privacy is no longer in your hands, even if you abstain from social media.

The studies, conducted at the University of Vermont and the University of Adelaide, found that they could predict a person’s posts on social media with 95% accuracy, even if they never had an account to begin with. The scientists got all the information they needed from a person’s friends, using posts from fewer than 10 contacts to build a mirror image of a person not even on the social network.  

The study, published Monday in the journal Nature Human Behavior, looked at more than 30 million public posts on Twitter (excluding retweets) from a total of 13,905 English-language users (attempting to eliminate bots and non-personal accounts) to populate their model. By using data provided by just 8 or 9 of a user’s contacts, the researchers were able to show that the tweets of friends allowed them to predict quite a bit about the original user. The original user’s Tweets allowed them to predict future tweets with an accuracy rate of roughly 64% and the user’s contacts gave them enough data to predict behavior with an accuracy rate of 61%. So, go ahead and delete your account, but information about you is still going to be generated (and pretty accurately) if you have a close relationship with at least 8 people who use the platform.

This analysis showed that “information within the Twitter messages from 8 or 9 of a person’s contacts make it possible to predict that person’s later tweets as accurately as if they were looking directly at that person’s own Twitter feed.”

“You alone don’t control your privacy on social media platforms,” University of Vermont professor Jim Bagrow said in a statement. “Your friends have a say too.” And even when you delete your social media accounts, if your friends are still there, tech giants are able to build profiles on you. This is already a concern that privacy advocates have about Facebook, called “shadow profiles.”

Now, there is a mathematical upper limit on how much predictive information a social network can hold. They can’t know everything about you, but they can know some things.

privacy in social media

So why is this information important? Businesses who want to sell you things or government agencies who want information about you can use this information to their benefit. Companies or agencies may not be able to find out your darkest secrets, but they can figure out things like your political or religious affiliation and products you might be interested in. The same things platforms like Facebook and Twitter know (and sell) about their users.

The researchers went on to acknowledge that their research “raises profound questions about the fundamental nature of privacy—and how, in a highly networked society, a person’s choices and identity are embedded in that network.”

“There’s no place to hide in a social network,” said 
co-author Lewis Mitchell.

Professor James Bagrow, also an author of the paper, confirmed: You alone don’t control your privacy on social media platforms. Your friends have a say too.

In April, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told lawmakers that the social network collected data on nonusers for “security purposes.” That includes people’s contact list when they use Facebook’s mobile app, which the company uses to suggest friend recommendations, it explained.

In response to the study, a Facebook spokeswoman said the company doesn’t build profiles on nonusers, even if it’s collecting data on them. “If you aren’t a Facebook user, we can’t identify you based on this information, or use it to learn who you are,” the company said in a statement.

The study shows there’s only so much you can control in terms of your own privacy and security online. As careful as you are online, the study suggests that you’re only as private as your friends have been.