Online digging: using the web as an investigative tool

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Online digging using the web as an investigative
tool

• Jaimi Dowdell and Mark Horvit
• IRE and NICAR

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Visualizing reporters work
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• Better search strategies
• Organizing your life
• Backgrounding people
• Backgrounding businesses
• Finding historical content
• What, or who, is behind a site
• Other resources

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First things first

• Strategy
• Know what youre after
• Know what is available
• Know when enough is enough
• Be a smarter searcher
• Be skeptical treat each online source just as
  you would any other
• Think about your own life

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Be a smarter Google searcher

• Advanced search
• Search for phrases
• Use Boolean logic
• By domain or site
• By file type

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Ready reference

• Wikipedia (for links, sources only)
• Census (esp. Data Finders feature)
• Public records portals
• BRB Publications
• Portico

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Whos Website is this?

• Domain searches reveal all.
• Domain Tools http//www.domaintools.com
• Allwhois http//www.allwhois.com

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Directories by and for journalists

• NICAR Net tour
• Reporters Desktop by Duff Wilson

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Investigating Politicians

• Salaries, travel www.legistorm.com
• Personal financial disclosure http//www.opensecr
  ets.org/pfds/
• State financial disclosure http//www.publicinteg
  rity.org/StateDisclosure/
• Cash and votes www.maplight.org
• From the source www.fec.gov

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Government Information

• FedStats www.fedstats.gov
• Portal to government statistics.
• FirstGov www.firstgov.gov
• Portal to federal and local governments.
• Federal spending www.fedspending.org

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Google has limits

• No one knows for sure, but estimates are that
  Google searches far less than half of whats
  available on the Web maybe a small fraction.
• Each search engine has its own strengths and
  weaknesses.
• Total shared results of any two search engines
  8.9 percent.
• Any three search engines 2.2 percent

Source 2007 study by Dogpile, Penn State and
Queensland University of Technology
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Get a second and third opinion

• Goal Regularly use two other search engines and
  their advanced features.
• Alltheweb.com (advanced search options)
• Ask.com (Subject-Specific Popularity)
• Clusty.com (clustered results)
• Yahoo! (directory)
• Jux2 (Multiple search site results returned)

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The Invisible Web

• The Visible Web (Surface Web) is made up of the
  typical results in search engines.
• The Invisible Web (Deep Web) includes
  searchable databases / dynamic content.
• Some estimate the Invisible Web is 550 times
  bigger than the Visible Web.
• Google says more than 1,000 federal government
  sites cant be crawled.
• Well show you some examples in backgrounding.

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Search the Dead Web

• Google cache
• Wayback Machine
• Library of Congress archiving project Mapping
  the Internet Electronic Resources Virtual Archive
  (MINERVA)
• CyberCemetery sites of defunct government
  agencies and commissions

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?

• Who is Jane or John Doe?

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Basic questions

• Who is he/she?
• Google, yes, Google
• Also check at least one other search engine.
• Zoominfo
• Where has he/she lived?
• Zabasearch
• Does the person still live there? Do they own?
• Subtitle Property records are fun
• BRB Publications

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More basic questions

• Neighbors?
• Whitepages
• Court records? Criminal information?
• Arizona courts
• Sex offender registry
• Inmates Arizona
• Criminalsearches

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Anything else?

• Deep Web searches
• Facebook
• Pipl
• 123people
• Whostalkin
• Samepoint
• Icerocket

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What can you learn about a famous person?
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Besides his batting average, what else can you
find out about Albert?
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• Get some basic facts.
• Find out where he lives.
• What can you find out about his house?
• What does he drive?
• Is he connected to any businesses or
  organizations?
• What else can we find out about them?
• Foundation
• Restaurant

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Backgrounding a business online

• Corporate records
• Arizona Corporation Commission
• Look for lawsuits in court records
• SEC filings
• Professional licenses
• Look up your state at BRB

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More on businesses

• UCC and liens
• Illinois and Missouri
• Form 990s for nonprofit organizations
• Trademarks and patents
• Lobbying and lobbyists
• Federal tax court