How to use online tools to track people and story leads
Hacks/Hackers Nairobi community take a deep dive into cybersecurity.
How liberating would it be to hack your way into private information? How then would you make use of it in your current profession? The August Nairobi Hacks/Hackers took a deep dive into cybersecurity, discovering tools for tracking people, documents, emails and even social media platforms.
Dr Bright Gameli, a cybersecurity researcher with Internet Solutions Kenya and founder of AfricaHackon kick-started the meetup with interesting insights on the Google platform and how best we can maximize its use. There are tools like haveibeenpwned which is a website that can let you know if your email address has been compromised. He also informed the audience how easy it is for someone to really know who you are through social media.
He added that, by using the photos you post on social media, someone can find information about you in the public domain that you did not even know was out there.
He was later joined by Jimm Wayans, a cyber/information security consultant who is currently the senior consultant for Secure-Sec Limited. The internet does not forget or lose data even when you delete them, Jimm clarifies. The internet has its own storage memory; what might not be visible at the time could still be retrieved after a few years.
Google also has an interesting way of extracting files like PDFs and documents from specific websites and e-mails. Here’s a list of hacks you can use for specific functions.
- If you want to search for a file in google and you don’t know how to access it, you can simply type in filetype:doc confidential
- If you want to find the social media site of a certain organisation and its members, you could type in linkedin.com -inurl:dir ‘at[nameoforganisation]’
- For emails, you could check ext:txt intext; yahoo.com ORAND Hotmail.com.
- It is also interesting to note that you can keep track of your social media time use by simply logging into myactivity.google.com
A little goes a long way as we unravel more tools and journalists can now use these tools to scope out new sources. Put the new hacking tips into practice and make your life much easier.
Watch a replay of the live stream from the August Hacks/Hackers meetup here.
The worlds of hackers and journalists are coming together, as reporting goes digital and Internet companies become media empires.
Journalists call themselves “hacks,” someone who can churn out words in any situation. Hackers use the digital equivalent of duct tape to whip out code.
Hacker-journalists try and bridge the two worlds. Hacks/Hackers Africa aims to bring all these people together — those who are working to help people make sense of our world. It’s for hackers exploring technologies to filter and visualize information, and for journalists who use technology to find and tell stories. In the age of information overload and collapse of traditional business models for legacy media, their work has become even more crucial.
Code for Africa, the continent’s largest #OpenData and civic technology initiative, recognises this and is spearheading the establishment of a network of HacksHackers chapters across Africa to help bring together pioneers for collaborative projects and new ventures.
Follow Hacks/Hackers Africa on Twitter and Facebook and join the Hacks/Hackers community group today.
