The Unsung Hero of Today — The Internet Sleuth
Two weeks ago the Marshall Fire swept through Boulder County, Colorado destroying over one thousand homes and killing three in under twenty-four hours. People walked into Costco on a sunny day and walked out to an apocalypse, as trees, buildings, businesses burned down, pets fled from the flames, and their community, which they loved burned to ashes in the wind.
Vanished in the amount of time it takes to choose the right wedge of manchego from the local cheese counter.
My sister, her husband, and one-year-old daughter were some of those people, fleeing the fire, praying the home they built would make it through the night. And while all this was happening, my wife, from the comfort of our home in Boston, was able to tell them they were one of the lucky ones. Before they were even able to return to their home, before the fires burned out in the snowstorm that followed, she was able to say with near certainty, they were one of three streets in their neighborhood the blaze did not touch.
How could she? When they were ten miles away and she was two thousand? Because, despite our convoluted relationship with the highs and lows of the internet, specifically social media, there is a side of our modern communication preference that is rarely discussed. Except for in the deep caverns of the Twittersphere, the back pages of Reddit, and in the bowels of 4chan, the internet sleuth is mainly glossed over.
The internet sleuth, web sleuths, whatever name you want to call them, is not just a growing community, but an established one, filled with retired police officers and journalists to lonely widows, and part-time mechanics. No degree or experience necessary, just time, desire, and an internet connection.
They come from all walks of life, with one goal, to solve what professionals can’t. To put to use knowledge acquired from countless murder documentaries and CSI marathons. And they are not Joe from You, but they use the same information and tactics as Joe, navigating the endless amount of personal information we have all haplessly left on the internet throughout the years. It is our “internet footprint” as a professor once told me. The traces of data we leave behind in our ever-documented digital lives.
I also want to be clear, my wife is not an internet sleuth, despite her tendency to call out unfair corporate practices and lying politicians with the occasional burner account. She is more of a sleuthing voyeur. One who follows the twists and turns of cases, as the internet uses its vast array of fresh eyes and resources to do what is natural for all humans, to find answers.
Sleuthing is what I would call a modern trend, one that has taken off over the past decade or so. When researching this article, the first confirmed case of successful internet sleuthing I could trace dates back to 2009, when sleuths were able to solve the murder of a lottery winning Florida man named Abraham Shakespeare.
The term sleuth/ internet sleuth has been around for a while but gained the most notoriety with the 2019 Netflix documentary Don’t F*** with Cats. No need to dive into the disturbing details of this one, but the crime was solved by a community of outraged sleuths. Perhaps the most recent and relevant story regarding the sleuth world is that of Gabby Petito and her ‘allegedly’ murderous fiance Brian Laundrie. The sleuths were out in full force on this one, identifying her van in the background of another travel blogger’s video, notifying authorities, leading to the discovery of her body. Would she have been found eventually? Maybe. But it was because of the sleuths this time.
Citizen investigations, people using their free time to do what the washed-up high school football player dressed as a cop couldn’t, have changed our world tremendously. From the capture of the Boston Bomber to Gabby Petito. It’s unclear how many crimes the internet has solved or blown open, I have seen lists from 6 to 30.
But one thing is clear, they are not deterred, and are not going away. If the ongoing saga of Carol Baskin and the Tiger King is any sign, the sleuths are here to stay.
I always say to my students, the internet is a gift and a curse, a tool, and a weapon. Anything good can also be bad, it’s all a matter of use and perception. Not to be too philosophical, but this is true in all facets of life, there is no light without the dark.
I usually fall on the side of, “the internet is now more of a distraction than a tool,” but this also comes from a jaded educator.
And I won’t get into the plights and destruction of our world due to social media excess and the impact on our cultural sanity.
What is important is the positive side of the internet. The heroes behind flatscreens. You know who I am talking about. That guy sitting in a bathtub in Wisconsin, wearing an armadillo helmet drinking their third glass of merlot while sifting through public phone records because it could lead to the exoneration of someone they never met.
There are good people in this world, no matter how hard that is to remember.
I saw my wife scrolling through Reddit and Twitter messaging total strangers, getting access to their Nest cams (with permission), talking to good samaritans with drones willing to fly over the area, all from the comfort of our couch. There were people rescuing strays and posting them online to find their owners. People who broke into homes (at the request of an owner who was away) to save a family heirloom.
It was truly incredible the vast amount of information she was able to gather in a few hours, and not just for my sister, but the community, reaching out with information she learned that didn’t even pertain to my family’s situation.
I think with all the negativity in our world, especially on and geared toward the internet, it’s important to remind ourselves not everyone online is a scammer. Not everyone is out there to cyberbully and put people down. The internet isn’t just for clout or followers. Sure there are plenty of Instagram bots trying to make me $10k a day if I just give them access to my Coinbase account. But there are also good people. Kind people. People who want to help, who want to support, who want to lift up, give advice, and provide a harmless laugh.
Or even, in some cases, solve a crime.
