AMU Careers Careers & Learning Cyber & AI Cybercrime Defense Homeland Security Intelligence Law Enforcement Privacy Public Safety Public Service Terrorism

When Officers Become the Target: How to Protect Yourself from Doxing

By Leischen Stelter, managing editor of In Public Safety

CBS News reported that after the fatal shooting of a man by a LAPD police officer, someone posted the officer’s private information online, including his home address, phone number, and other personal details including his child’s school location.

Police and social media lawsThis practice of researching and broadcasting personally identifiable information about an individual is referred to as doxing (or doxxing) and is typically done with malicious intent. The information published can be anything from home addresses to vehicle identification to social media accounts. Once individuals have been exposed through doxing, they may be targeted for online harassment. Doxing is becoming enough of a concern that the FBI and the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) have issued warnings to law enforcement and public officials.

Protecting Yourself and Your Family
American Military University (AMU) recently hosted a webinar on this topic as part of its Law Enforcement Webinar Series. Presenter James Deater, who spent more than 23 years as a Maryland State Trooper specializing in wiretaps and other forms of electronic investigation techniques, provided advice for how officers can protect themselves.

“Any officer could end up in a situation where you do everything right in accordance with agency policy, but the incident is captured on video and it looks wrong to the public. It happens all the time and as soon as your name is released to the public, you become a target,” said Deater. “You may not be able to stop it, but you can at least make it difficult for people to find your private information.”

Here are some recommendations Deater made about how to protect your personal information:

  • Be aware of security and privacy settings on your accounts. Be selective about who you share information with and limit how often you post about your location (especially if it’s your home).
  • Routinely update computers, devices, and software with the latest security fixes.
  • Use anti-virus software.
  • Pay close attention to links and attachments in email messages. Do not open anything that looks even remotely suspicious. If it’s legitimate, the person can always send it again.
  • Add protection to your email, social media, and online bank accounts using two-factor authentication techniques.
  • Choose unique, strong passwords for each of your accounts and change your passwords regularly.
  • Remember that anything you post on social media might be used against you. Once it’s online, you cannot take it back.

Request Information Be Removed
During the webinar, Deater discussed ways that officers can proactively remove personal information from the dozens of websites that sell this information. He included specific details about what forms to submit, what identification documents to send, and how long it will take for information to be removed. However, some of this information is law enforcement-sensitive and cannot be included in this piece. If you are a police officer, you can request to view the recorded webinar by sending an email (using your agency email address) to James Deater (JDeater@apus.edu).

Due to the level of interest, AMU will soon be hosting additional webinars on doxing. To be notified when this and other new webinars are announced, please complete this form.

Here are a few sites to consider removing your information from:

It can take a considerable amount of time and effort to properly submit the forms, especially if officers are also removing their spouses and children from such databases. However, the time it takes to remove this information is worth it to protect—or at least deter—a malicious attack on an officer and his or her family.

Leischen Stelter headshot_v4About the Author: Leischen Stelter is the editor of American Military University’s premier blog, In Public Safety. She writes about issues and trends relevant to professionals in law enforcement, corrections, fire services, emergency management, and national security. You can follow AMU on Twitter @AMUPoliceEd or Facebook.

 

Leischen Kranick is a Managing Editor at AMU Edge. She has 15 years of experience writing articles and producing podcasts on topics relevant to law enforcement, fire services, emergency management, private security, and national security.

Comments are closed.