skekek

Thave been active in my community for years. Not long ago, far-
right trolls found social media accounts of my friends, family, and
workplace. They stalked me and used the photos they found of me
and my family members t0 assemble tmelines of my life and to map
my social networks. Because of my anti-racist beliefs, they used the
information they gathered to threaten me, my family, and my friends.
In every harassing cmail and social media comment, they character-
ize the projects I par
a*leader” and member of an imaginary “shadowy mob of violent

ipate in as “terrorist groups,” describing me as

Iefists” that they want to “do something serious about.” Whether
these conclusions are just shoddy investigative work or intentionally
dishonest misrepresentations, their behavior should be concerning to
anyone who believes in standing up against oppression.

T deactivated my social media when 1 learncd that this was un-
derway—not because 1 am ashamed of being associated with the

struggle for a freer world, but because I want to protect my friends
and social networks. Anyone who knows me know
Toppose all forms of bigotry and appression. They did not target me
specifically for anything in particular I have done, but because they
are opposed to all anti-racist, feminist, and queer activism and they
think that they can isolate and intimidate us one by one. This is why
we need to stand by each other

Twant you to know about this in case you ever find yourself in the

tis no sccret that

same situation. You are not alone. T hope this encourages you to think
seriously about your personal online sccurity and the security of your
family members and friends

Robert Bowers, the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter, publicly
chatied with alt-right trolls who doxxed anti-racists. The stalking
campaign against me shows that they are willing to manufacturc
falschoods to put people in those crosshairs. The only way to protect

THIS ARTICLE IS AVAILABLE ONLINE

WWW.CWC.IM/DOXCARE
PLEASE FOLLOW ALONG THERE FOR
DIRECT LINKS TO THE RESOURCES
MENTIONED IN THIS ZINE.
WHAT IS DOXXING

Doxxing means publishing a person’s private information with the
intention of exposing and intimidating them. This can result in
physical, emotional, and cconomic harm to the target. It is intend-
ed to dissuade the target from action and to shame them for the
ideas and values. It is important to take sccurity seriously before you
are doxxed—before you even have reason to fear that you could be
doxxed. Often a doxxer will wait unil they have gathered a lot of
formation before releasing it. It is possible that you are already being
stalked and will not find out uniil it is too late.

Whether you are a well-known public activist or hardly involved at
all, you should protect your social networks and other spheres of your
life—even if you don’t think you are doing anything that would war-
rant attention. Maintaining good practices proteets your fiiends, fam-
ily, and community. It is common for people to be included in right-
wing conspiracy theories about *Antifa members” solely because they
are queer or trans, “look like a leftist,” play
or hang out in radical spaces. The information does not have to be
correct or justified for someone to target you. All a harasser needs is
one picce of information to begin to seek more details online.

Being aware of what information trails you leave online can pro-
tect you from law enforcement as well as stalkers. Now that stat
posed surveillance is increasingly sophisticated and livestreaming has
become normal at protests, just wearing a mask is often not enough.
In June 2020 in Philadelphia, investigators identified a woman start-
ing with nothing more than a blurry photo of her. They followed a
trail of breaderumbs including an Etsy purchase, twitter accounts,
and her professional work page. Customs and Border Protection have
started to trawl public social media. Securing your online pre:
can make you feel more sccure taking action offfinc.

bands, attend an event,

5
AN OUNCE OF PREVENTION IS
WORTH A POUND OF CURE

There’s no better time to start than now: Afier you have been doxxed,
you may not be able to climinate the information that is out there
evenif you try to get it taken down.

There are many different ways to approach this. Obviously, the
best way o ensure that no one can find any information about you
is to have nothing available—but some people can't climinate
online presence, whether because of work, family, or other respon-

sibiliies. In some cases, there are strategic reasons to maintain some

sort of online persona; for example, having a longstanding, believable

but innocuous social media account may be helpful for non-citizens
crossing the US border. Thankfully there are ways to firewall dis-
tinct spheres of your lfe, curate a public profile if you necd one, and
empowered
to continue taking action in your community. This process can be

adopt practices that can help you and your friends to fo

tedious. Tt will take time and encrgy. I recommend doing it together
with friends, roommates, o family members to help through some of
the difficult or boring aspects.

MAINTAINING SEPARATE SPHERES

If you cannot completely delete yourself from the internet, you can

ntaining distinct spheres of online
activity and cleaning up forgotten or infrequently used accounts

You likely have more than one online presence. This could include
Social networks, message boards, job sites, email accounts—anything
you need to log into. Often in doxing, information s triangulated
from many different sources. One way to reduce the amount of infor-
mation available to doxxers s to partition these spheres so they are
not connected to cach other. This is a highly individualized process;
take some time to consider the following questions and map out your
own online spheres

Do you spend your time on r/politics or the wall of a Facebook

acquaintance debating? Do you frequently like or repost statuses
from radical Instagram or Twitier accounts? Do you have images or
personal information on job boards? Do you buy things on Etsy or

1
eBay? Do any of your friends post pictures of you on their Instagram
accounts? Do you have to promote yourself online for the linc of
work you are in? Do you connect with your co-workers, family mem-
bers, and activist friends using the same account? Do you use parts of
your real name or birthday for usernames or emails? Each of these
may not be a problem in and of itself, but together they can cre:
links between different spheres of your life

Ask yourself:
+ How separate are cach of the
* What is public? What is private?

* What does public and private mean in the context of cach site?
* What can be found by scarching your legal name?

+ Do you use the same username or email for multiple accounts?
Do these cross over into distinct spheres of your life? Take a mo-
ment to think about the way in which all of these spheres over-
lap offtine.

Does your job allow you to be open about your politics?

How public is your activism? Do you speak o reporters? Do you

work at an infoshop?
Do you filter some or all of your social media content from

nces to illegal or controversial activities in a

Here arc a few examples of how your online presence can overlap
across different sites
RELATIVES How open is the rel;
your blood/legal relatives? If a strang

nship between you and
x had information on
just one person in this network, what could they
the others?

POLITICS Do you discuss or post about your politi
online? If so, on which platforms?

FRIENDS AND COMMUNITY If you have social media,
who are your friends? Your followers? In what ways do your on-
line communities reflect your IRL communities?

iscover about

i belicfs

HOBBIES What hobbies do you have? Do you have friends and
community through them? Are you a part of any internet com-
munities dedicated to those hobbies?

LEGAL Who arc you on paper? What names, phone numbers,
and addresses are you tied to? Do any of your accounts include
this information? Do any other sites (probably without your
permission)?

CAREER Docs your job imvolve an online presence, website, or
Social media account? Would there be a problem if your politics
overlapped with your carcer? Or is your carcer in some way tied
to your political identity?

Take time to consider where you overlap, what your online goals
are, and where you can separate these spheres.

TACTICS

Lets talk about how to discover what information is available about
you, how to identify and climinate trails, and what online resources
exist 10 remove them.

Begin with what is publicly available. Google yourself and make
alist of all of your social media accounts. Delete old accounts for
things you no longer use. This is also a good time to download a
password manager like LastPass to assist you in managing unique
usernames, emails, and passwords.

DELETE OFF SNOOP SITES/DATA BROKERS

Find out what information people can find out about you simply
using a search engine. Scarch for yourself on DuckDuckGo and Goo-
gle. Try doing this search in incognito mode. Try different versions
of your name, with and with out your middle name and in quotation
marks. You could set Google Alerts to send you emails when your
name s published on the internet. This will give you a sens of how
much data about you is available online to people who are not in
your network.

6
After this initial scarch, have a look at all of the data broker sites
that profit on trading in personal data. I also encourage you to

move your closest family members at the same time. This process can
be arduous; these stes try to make it as difficult as possible o delete
information about yourself, There are some things you can't remove

yourself from—for example, if you recently registered to vote and
silllive at that address. (This is another reason some people choose
not to vote.)

The most trafficked host sites includee: Been-verified, Check-
People, Instant Checkmate, Intelius, PeckYou, PeopleFinders, Peo-
pleSmart, Pipl, PrivatcEye, PublicRecords360, Radaris, Spokeo, USA
People Scarch, TruthFinder.com, Nuwber, OncRep, and Family-
TreeNow: I recommend starting with these by searching cach one
on Joindeleteme.com, which has a guide for opting out of virtually
every data broker. If you have more money than time, you can pay
for the service called Delete Me to have your information removed,

f you have alrcady

but T usually only recommend this serv
been doxsed

delete old accounts
When you search yourself in a online search engine, you may also
find old accounts. It can be good to do a reverse search using all of
names you can remember. Accounts

the old user names and scre
you have not used in a long
they are using an older password, they can try that accounts tech-

me can make you vulnerable because if

nical support to get more data about you that they can try to use for
other accounts. Download any material of sentimental value to you
and permanently close all the accounts you no longer use. These can
be full of clues about your lfe.

First, g0 to namechk com, which scarches over hundreds of plat-
forms for specific usernames, and search all the possible usernames
and emails you have used. This will ell you what platforms have
accounts using that handle.

Sccond, go to backgroundchecks.
the website domain. This website arc
websites, categorizes how easy or d

Jjustdeleteme and type in
a huge array of cxisting
ult they make it o delete an
‘delete profile” page for

account, and provides the link to the

respective site.

Haveibeenpwned.com will help you find out if there arc any data
breaches involving any accounts you hold. If there arc, take immedi-
ate action to change passwords

change usernames/email/passwords
The casiest way for someone to find more information about you is
arch your nam

to liases

and usernames. To keep your spheres
of internet activ

y scparate, always use a new username when you
ccount. If you have a professional website for work and
must use you legal name, make sure the email you use for that ac-
count is used solely for that purpose. You may have to have a handful
of email accounts and usernames. | have one for all of my medical
and governmental accounts, one for my online shopping, one for my
political lfe, and one for my social media, another for dating sites,
and so on. T use aliases and false information for all the websi

create an

s that

represent me or display photos of me.

A password manager is a great help for this, as it will store log-
ins for all of your accounts. I recommend LastPass, which you can
download for your phone and web browser. It might be tempting to
leave yourself permanently signed in, but always make sure o sign
out when you are done using it. First, so you don't forget the master
password—and also to ensure that even if somcone manages to gain
access to your phone or computer, they can't access all your personal
data. Take this time to create new emails and change usernames for

all of the accounts you aren't go

ig o delete. You can casily create
new emails using Protonmail. LastPass can help gencrate random
string passwords, which are the most sccure.

curate what is available &
change your privacy settings
Once you have eliminated all your loose ends, take a look at what you
chose (o retain and what can be found there. If you keep any social
media accounts, go through your profile and note what people can
find out about you. You can choose from a range of strategies regard-
ing how to approach this, depen

g on how cautious you want (o be
and how certain are that it is possible to keep your different spheres
of internet activity distinct

2
Some of your options include:
+ Deleting all photos of yourself, your pets, your car, your mailbox,
nd anything clsc that includes unne
information-—esp

tattoos,

ally your public profle picture.

+ Eliminating or falsifying any personal details in your profile—
give an inaccurate birthday or no birthday at all, choose random
answers for your hometown, schools you have attended, and other
inform:

+ Deleting questionable followers and friends. I you change all of
your social media settings to private and you fel confident about
your followers list, there may be less reason to hide your face. Tstll
recommend keeping details about your location and intimate per-

sonal lfe offine. Remember, you are only as safe as the most open
person

firiends and family separate, do not post pictures of them or their
personal information without their informed consent, and remem-
ber that social connections are visible through social networking
and data collection websites.

your life. If you choose to be more public, keep your

The Coach from Crash Override Network is a helpful sicp-by-
step guide that links you directly to the privacy scttings page for
many commaonly used social networks. Click “Let’s Get Started” and
“Strengthen the sceurity of my online accounts so people can't break
into them as casily,” and follow their guides for all the top social me-
dia companies. This guide can also help with other aspects of online
sccurity, 3o after you've done that, I recommend finishing the Coach
helper and checking out what other resources they offer

When you think you are done, have a friend try to create a profile
based on what information they can find about you while pretend-
ing to be a “doxxer” to see if anything you didn't think of slipped
through the cracks. It may be important to periodically check in on
what can be found by scarching your name every few months.

IF YOU HAVE BEEN DOXXED

We do not recommend approa
for ever). The police may use the information you give them about
the harassers, but they will also use the information they

hing the police when you are doxxed

about

9
you and other individuals and groups you may have been publicly
associated with. Once that is on fle,its permanendy in their hands,
and there’s no guarantee they won't use it to target you or others with
state repression.

If you chose to involve the police, please be transparcnt and do
not ask any radical groups to support you. Be sure to inform any
‘groups that you arc connected with of your decision. Usually; the
police will do nothing or make the situation much worse. The ides
of this guide is to provide you with alternatives based in community
support and empowerment.

h

should I go public?
Short answer: Do not immediately react publicly. Take
time to secure yourself and alert your networks privately
before reacting publicly.

Your first impulse may be to alert as many people as you can im-
mediately with a public announcement o to shut everything down.
Going public in this way can provide you with immediate support if
you have a sympathetic audience, but it carries the risk of increased
aggression from harassers. There are good arguments for being cau-
he most important thing to

tious with information at the beginning
dofirstis to take steps to protect yourself and your networks against
further harm.

Immediate announcements can complicate your security cfforts.
Whether or not th
is likely to usc it to

nformation posted about you is accurate, no one

ause you any serious harm without frst confirm-

ing at least some of it. Posting on a social media account confirming
your doxx immediately confirms that the information about you is
accurate; it also indicates that you have seen where it was posted and
suggests that you are terrified. This furthers the goals of your b
rassers. They want to intimidate and isolate you. Do not confirm or
deny any of the information they have dug up about you, regardless
of whether it is false or embarrassing They are secking a reaction. If
you let them know that what they have posted is incorect, they may
conclude that they are on the right track and they just need to keep
nitial public responses

digging Sometimes, one of the most cffe
is no response at all-—don't make any major changes to your posting

1"
habits or show any fear: This can send the message that your dosxer
missed the mark, and that the attack was a failure.

After you have had time to process your feclings and sccure your
position, it may be strategic to go public and perhaps to band togeth-
ith other people who are in a similar situation. You may be able
to leverage the public outrage over white supremaciss to ¢
campaign to dissuade further doxxing —for example, make a finding
drive with pledges to give money for every harassing email you or
others in your community receive! Since your harassers want to iso-
late you, public support like this may dissuade further intimidation.
Try to be creative, resilient, and strategic. Be careful not to endanger
anyone else in this proc

‘When making public statements, if you posture or brag about
your abilities, your ability to employ violence, weapons with which
you can defend yourself or oversate your ferociousness, you may bite
off more than you can chew, It is generally not a good idea to misrep-
resent yourself. Talking dircetly or indircetly to the harassers does not
usually improve matters. T recommend making a positive statement
asserting your ethics and belicfs, describing how your ident
ideals have made you a target but maintaining that while these cam-
paigns of harassment arc intended to make you cowes
do so, because you have no reason to hide your polities. Avoid talking
about specific actions or groups, whether or not you are involved
with them.

ate

ou will not

IMMEDIATELY AFTER BEING DOXXED

1. Dot panic. Call a close friend to come over and help.

2. Create an incident log. Keep records for both online and
offline provocations. This is crucial to identifying the patterns
of the attacks. It can be useful to compare these with other
organizers in order to identify larger patterns so as to identify
your opponents and their organizations.

3. Alert your friends, family, and sensitive political net-
works privately. Task a few friends that you trust with your
personal information to help report social media and blog posts
that doxx you, identifying them as harassment. Do so reps
edly. Some platforms lack policies that will protect you, even if

I
these posts include accurate personal information, even if they
put you in danger. Sometimes, doxxers will use your photos
and information to make imposter accounts. Itis usually casier
to report these as fakes; try to do so quickly in order to prevent
them from obiaining more information from your networks by
posing as you. You, your family; and your employer may begin
threatening or harassing phone calls. Let them know
happening as quickly as you can and instruct them not
to engage with the harassers.

Shut down the flow of information. If you are reading
this section and have not done the preventative care section,
begin that process. Download a password manager like Last-
Pass and change all of your passwords immediately. You can
also pay for a service called Delete Me that will take much of
your online footprint off of snoop sites that harvest and dis-
play personal information. This service will take care of the
information aggregated by the data brokers but not any social
media, web accounts, news articles, or arrest records you may
haye, those will have to be handled on your own. It is import-
ant to balance the hemorthage of information, while also not
alerting your harassers that the dox was effective or on target.
Try to shore up your social media accounts by making friends
lists and information private in order to protect your networks
uniil you are sure that they don't offer vulnerable personal in-
formation to those willing to dig for it. How you react publicly
is a very delicate situation and should be handled carcfully
throughout this process.

Set up a safety plan. Recruit friends and family to support
you. Let them know what is going on; doxxing can be traumat-
ic and you need to prioritize your mental and physical health
so that you can work through these attacks. These conversa-
ons can be difficult—especially if they do not understand

the nuances of this political moment, if it the first time they
are hearing about a particular flavor of hate group, or if your
relationships are strained due 1o political or personal differenc-
s If you don't fecl up t0 it, you could ask a friend who has a
good understanding of the situation to have the more difficult

to rece

what

ions for you.

2
If your home address is included in the dox, find somewhere
new you can stay if you are able. If you can't leave your home, invite
fiiends or a local sccurity group to stay with you. Make a “go bag”
with everything you will need if you have to pack up and go with
el notice.

evaluating threats

If you don't feel you are at any great risk, especially if your doxs
comprised of frecly-available information or is just sent directly to
you in an effort to unnerve you, you may feel fine dismissing it as a
cheap intimidation tactic, blocking and reporting the harasser, and
moving on. It may just be a matter of someone trying to get a rise
out of you. However, if your doxs includes sensitive personal infor-
mation, especially details that are not casy to obtain with simple de-
tective work, or it appears in a public forum where people distribute
information in hopes that others will act on it, you may want to take
frther precautions. This s especially true if you arc
a targeted group or demographic

When you learn that you have been doxed, its important to
establish which information could translate into credible threats
Oficn, doxsing is a precursor to more intrusive offline harassment,
oris connected with threats o act on the information. This could
be anything from threatening phone calls to family or workplaces to
pointed death threats or a SWAT call

Itis sometimes difficult to determine what makes a threat “eredi-
ble.” The most common tactic of ordinary doxxersis to send creepy
imidating messages wherever they think they can reach you~—
social media, email, and to family members, and the like. They will
often imply that they have more information than they really do; it's
common for them to say that they have provided this information to
local law enforcement. Their goal is to intimidate you out of acting;
ion they post publically is allthat they have.

Your employer may receive calls demanding that they fire you
Thus far, it is rare that the targets of doxxing have been physically
attacked, but it has happened, and it is possible that those who doxx
you may make efforts to get your information into the hands of
people who are not acting rationally or ethically It is important to be
cautious, but don't panic or immerse yourself in ansicty.

ready part of

often, whatever informa

13
Ask yourself:

+ Is the information accurate? Do they have your home, work, or
family address? Do they know places you hang out? Who you are
friends with?

+ Are you atrisk of losing your job if they find out any of this infor-

mation about you?

Do you know where the harassers live? Are they close to your

physical community or just online trolls on a decentralized forum’

Do you have reason to believe law enforcement will b

in this information? Is the information being shared from local

right-wing news sources, putting your face in front of a multitude
of hos

Do they have embarrassing or private photos of you?

erested

trangers who now have your information?

Is there information tying you to criminal activity that could get
you arrested?

solutions
Here are some things you can do in response to the dangers that can
arise from being doxxed:
e selfdefense plan, sign up for self-defense classes, contact
a local community defense group.
+ Inform the people and groups that are named in the doss —work-

place, comrades, roommates, family

+ Talk through your fears with people you trust

+ Contact people who have been through this before for advice.

+ Arrange to have a lawyer available if you are worried that the
information about you may be of interest to state actors.

+ Conneet with a local anti-fascist group—they may be able to help
identify the doxxers.

having conversations with jobs and family
This conversation can be very difficult, especially if your relationship
with your family is strained. Have a cool-headed friend on call to
help mediate or support you afierwards if necessary
Think about how ofien you are willing to be vulnerable with your
family and how much opportunity you will have in the future to follow

up on the conversation. If it’s necessary to speak to family members

i
but you fecl like you will only get one chance, you can rehearse with a
friend and prepare for their reactions. If you have an ongoing, conver-
sational, rusting relationship, you can explain the situation to them in
a series of smaller conversations, instead of one long sit-down. Evalu-
ate how much time and how much attention you will have.

It has always helped me to frame this as “having a stalker” to people
who I do not want to have a political comversation with-— that may suf-
fice to explain the severity of the situation and why you need privacy;
Butit can be worth the effort to be honest about what's going on. This
can help build stronger relationships and demystify this common oc-

currence, while encouraging others who may not have considered that
it could happen to them or someone they know to take online privacy
seriously. Most people will respond with fear and sympathy, though
sometimes they will suggest or even insist that you call the policc.
ize-fits-all approach. In my case, T had to com-

pel my conservative mother to promise that she would not involve

There is no one-

the police. 1 did so by appealing to my right to personal safety and
my autonomy as the victim in the situation, asking her to respect my
wishes and reminding her that the police can do very litle to respond
o targeted harassment like this—and all that calling them would do
would be to open me up to their scrutiny; since I was being accused

of criminal activity. Such conversations can be very difficult, but they
are often necessary. Remind your friends and family not to react or
respond to any phone calls, emails, or social media requests

You can read a guide for how to discuss this with your employer in

the online article.

Things to remember when talking
t0 your friends and family

+ The harassers’ goal i to strain your relationships and ruin your
life. Do not let them succeed at doing this. Tell your family that
the best way to support you s to refuse to give in to their tactics.

+ Don't throw anarchists and anti-fascists under the bus or claim
that you are being targeted for no reason. This will not serve
youif reasons emerge—and it will only delegitimize and fur-
ther endanger those who can't distance themselves from anar-
chist poliics.

15
+ Do notlet anyone blame you for what is happening, whether for
the politics you adhere to or your perceived irresponsibility for
getting yourself “into this situation.” Fighting for a better world
involves challenges. If anything,
provoked this response by your cfforts

Suggest concrete ways you can help them understand the situation

and protect themselves. Send them this article or a list of resourc-

es; offer to help them lock down their social media if they are not
tech savvy:

+ Talk through what they can prepare for—harassing phone calls,
emails, perhaps the neighbors will receive messages about you,
Prepare them for worsi-case scenario, but emphasize that it
is unlikely

+ Be clear about what you need from them.

itis to your credit that you have

LIVING YOUR LIFE, MOVING FORWARD

Take a deep breath. Do not blame yourself. Emotionally this can be
decply disturbing and disruptive, adding a layer of acute stress to
your life. be people out there who know what you look
ike and you will have no idea who they are. Sometimes information
from doxxes becomes a permanent part of the internet if you name
is googled; this can affect your job prospects. Sometimes nothing
comes from the attention—but there

There ma

always the possibility that
someone will iy to pick up where the last doxser lefi off.

Until you are sure that your time in the spotlight is over, you may
haye to alter some aspects of your life. Ask yourself, “What kind of
life do T want to live? How can I manage my anxiety? Are there ways
T can embrace b

ng a more public figure? How can I feel secure in
taking risks and being active again?” Especially as political tensions
intensiff; it may be important to take more extreme safety measures.

Here are some of the measures you
might choose to employ:

+ Do notlet anyone photograph you unless you trust them to handle
th
ward conversations, especially at family events or in professional

images the way you need them to. This can create some awk-

16
situations. Be aware of who appears in photos with yous inform
them that appearing in a photo with you may attract unwanted
attention. It can be helpful to rehearse the conversations you may
need to have.

Install rail cameras at your house.

Keep logs of all harassment you experience.

If you move, do not update your address. Do not e

as this makes your address publicly available. Try 0 hold on to
your old driver’s license or ID and receive mail at a post office.
box. Consider when to use a real address and when to use a fake
one or omit your address altogether when you sign up for things

onlin or in person.

+ Use pseudonyms online and in person if need be. Don't use the
same one over and over

* When you go to actions, especially if you don't mask up, be aware
what groups, places, or individuals could be implicated by being
seen or photographed in your vicinity

defense classes. This can include weapons train-
ing. but should include defensive and disarming training.

+ Invest time in sc

a therapist to work through any trauma you have experienced.

+ Help your friends and family understand the importance of on-
line sccurity

+ Have frank conversations with people outside your cireles of
political affinity. You may be surpriscd at how much empathy
they express.

No matter how hard the people targeting you try make you feel
isolated, you are not in this alone. As a community, we must protect
cach other and our online networks from harassment, imprisonment,
political violence, and intimidation.

Together, we can do this
No matter hnw hard [he Ip Ple target-
you try make Jouft feel 1solat

are not in'this alone. As a commum we

must protect each other and our online

networks from harassment, imprison-

ment, political violence, and intimidation.

Together, we can do this.