Models and Tools for Verification and Debunking

Hi everyone, here is that list of useful tools to remind you what they are for!

Sites/tools to help you track down people via their social/online profiles

A. Twitter

http://twopcharts.com/
Best use: see who a Twitter user has interacted with the most to help you track down
friends/associates.

Finding Twitter List

Twitter doesn’t allow you to search for lists. Use Google search ​site:twitter.com/*/lists

https://followerwonk.com/

https://twitter.com/search-advanced?lang=en
Use this to get someone’s Twitter details on:
● When was the account created?
● What were its earliest tweets?
● Where are they tweeting from?(Started location/content of previous tweets)
● Who do they follow? Who follows them?
● Are there links to other social profiles?

B. Facebook

https://intelx.io/tools?tab=facebook
Facebook graph Searcher

https://inteltechniques.com/menu.html ​(currently not working)

Use this to search for users’ activity on Facebook and other networks. Try it on yourself first!
Log onto the site and navigate to the Facebook search (look on the left sidebar)
Paste in the user number using the method above and then click “populate all” and search
away.
Eg: I put in my Facebook user ID using the method above and searched “future event
invitations” and it generated a list of all the events I’ve RSVPd to. Creepy.
https://lookup-id.com/

C. Instagram

https://www.searchmy.bio/
To find a certain bio on Instagram

https://instasave.io/
To save Instagram Videos, Photos, and Albums  
https://storiesig.com/
To save Instagram stories

D. Website

https://who.is/
Who.is, Whois.Icann and whois.com will tell you when and where the site was registered and by
who, although these days there are many domains are able to choose to hide their details. But it
was taken down and no longer active.

https://domainbigdata.com/
Another web that will tell you when and where the site was registered and by who.

Other search engines worth bookmarking:

http://www.peekyou.com/
https://www.spokeo.com/

Google Reverse Image search

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/search-by-image-by-google/dajedkncpodkggklbegccj
pmnglmnflm?hl=en
This extension allows you to initiate a Google search using any image on the web. By the
Google Images team. (Note: You can also do web based searches using
https://images.google.com/​)

RevEye Reverse Image Search

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/reveye-reverse-image-sear/keaaclcjhehbbapnphnmp
iklalfhelgf?hl=en
Perform a search by image. Choose between the image search engines Google, Bing, Yandex,
TinEye and Baidu. This extension allows to perform an inverse image search by right-clicking
onto any image in a web site.

Other photo verification resources

Izitru
https://www.izitru.com/
Upload your original, unmodified JPEG image. This tool will analyse an image to certify that it
hasn't been edited if someone claims to have an original.

Jeffrey's Image Metadata Viewer

http://exif.regex.info/exif.cgi
Use this to extract metadata from images - including, if you are fortunate, date and time!

WATCH VIDEO - Use Google Earth to verify images like a pro

https://firstdraftnews.com/resource/how-to-verify-images-like-a-pro-with-google-earth/

WATCH VIDEO - Check the upload time of an image on Instagram

https://firstdraftnews.com/resource/how-to-check-the-upload-time-of-an-instagram-post/

Open this post on Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BTWZMe4gM11/?taken-by=nytimes&hl=en
● Click on the three dots.
● Click on embed and then scroll to the end of the code to find the upload time and date.
● Convert time using Google.

https://www.flightradar24.com/60,15/6

Use Facebook to get the GMT of an Instagram image

● Copy Instagram link and paste into a Facebook message compose. Wait for it to load.
● Remember! This is only the upload time and date, not when the image was taken.

Amnesty YouTube Data viewer

http://www.amnestyusa.org/citizenevidence/
Use this to check the upload time on a YouTube video - will also generate screenshots for
reverse image searches

InVID Verification untuk Youtube

https://www.invid-project.eu/tools-and-services/invid-verification-plugin/

Geosearch Tool
http://www.geosearchtool.com/
Lets you search for where/when a YouTube video was uploaded and plots on a map.
Searchable by keyword.

NOTE! ​Be mindful of social platform conventions!

Whatever platform you source information from, be aware they all have their own time/date
display conventions:

● YouTube and Instagram: ​Posts are date-stamped with Pacific Time, which is the time
at their respective headquarters in California
● Twitter​: Post time is based on YOUR computer or device settings.
 ● Facebook​: Based on YOUR computer or device settings, not the local time of the user
who posted the content.

Other really useful stuff:

Wolfram Alpha
www.wolframalpha.com
Use WolframAlpha to ask certain questions, such as the weather in a certain place at a certain
time, to verify images or video shared on social media.

Use Google Maps to geolocate Tweets from a breaking news event.

● Open Google Maps ​https://www.google.com.au/maps
● Look up a place
● Right click on the red tag and “What’s here” to find the latitude and longitude. Copy it.
● Open Twitter
● In the search bar, paste the Lat/Long after the word ​near: ​and​ ​remove the space
between the two numbers! Then type within:1km at the end (or another radius)
● Click on “Latest” to see the latest tweets

Suncalc
http://suncalc.net/
Use Suncalc to check the shadows, ​sun movement and sunlight phases during the given day at
the given location.

Other mapping tools:

Google Maps
https://www.google.com/maps

Wikimapia
http://wikimapia.org/
Wikimapia is a multilingual open-content collaborative map, where anyone can create place
tags and share their knowledge. Lets you examine locations by categories including schools
and military sites.

Yandex
https://yandex.com/maps/
A Russian version of Google Maps that also has a street view function.

Baidu
http://map.baidu.com/
Another Google competitor that offers maps with a street view function.

Bing Maps
https://www.bing.com/maps/
Alternative maps from Microsoft

Newsroom tools to check out

 ● CrowdTangle​ ​helps with early discovery and monitoring of social content (FREE)
● Tweetdeck​ is indispensable for organising people you are following on Twitter into lists
(FREE)
● Google Trends​ to surface searches about candidates and campaign claims in real time
from all over the country (FREE)
● Storyful​ - a source of verified video and other user-generated content for newsrooms
(subscriber service)

Digital Hygiene

https://browsercheck.qualys.com/
To check on your browser, is it up to date?

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.thoughtcrime.securesms&hl=en
Signal private messenger

https://howsecureismypassword.net/
Check how secure are your password?

https://haveibeenpwned.com/
Check if you have an account that has been compromised in a data breach

https://www.virustotal.com/#/home/url
You can copy paste a link here to verify if it has already been flagged as malicious.

Two Factor Authentication for Email, Facebook, and Twitter

https://securityinabox.org/id/
For more information about digital security

LEARN MORE
First Draft Resources
https://firstdraftnews.com/

First Draft Verification Guides

https://firstdraftnews.com/resource/verifying-photos-videos/

First Draft Chrome Extension

https://firstdraftnews.com/launching-new-chrome-extension-newscheck/

Google News Initiative Training Center

https://newsinitiative.withgoogle.com/training/

Google News Lab Verification Course

https://newslab.withgoogle.com/course/verification
Fact check tag in Google Search, Google News
https://blog.google/products/search/fact-check-now-available-google-search-and-news-around-world/
https://blog.google/topics/journalism-news/labeling-fact-check-articles-google-news/

Other Verification toolset

https://start.me/p/ZGAzN7/verification-toolset