OSINT Blog
Accessing Information in Locked-Down Environments: How OSINT Practitioners Navigate Digital Barriers
Authoritarian states treat information as a weapon. The U.S. Intelligence Community’s 2025 Annual Threat Assessment highlights how countries like China and Russia are escalating their efforts to control, distort, and restrict the flow of information at home and abroad. These regimes aren’t just blocking platforms, they’re weaponizing content, embedding…
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Too Good to Be True? Understanding the Risks of Free OSINT Tools
Open-source intelligence practitioners have long used manual techniques to comb through publicly available data in order to derive insights. However, many users today have come to rely on automated tools to speed up their work. Truth be told, contending with growing caseloads and the massive ocean of public info that is the internet, it’s impractical…
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Antiques and OSINT - Investigating the Trafficking of Valuables
Criminal trafficking can call to mind the widely recognized and destructive trade of narcotics or people, but there’s a different kind of illegal trade that’s less visible: the illicit trafficking of antiques and other cultural treasures. Protecting historical relics and art is a global issue that continues to gain attention, highlighted by the United…
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Navigating the Maze of False Information during OSINT Investigations
At this year’s OSMOSISCon, Skopenow’s digital investigations expert, Steve Adams, took the stage to discuss one of the most pressing issues facing OSINT practitioners today: how to navigate the murky waters of false information in search of the truth. Here, we’ll review his session’s key takeaways and the strategies he covered, which offer insights…
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The ROI of Automated OSINT, Part III: Investigating Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking
Law enforcement agencies—from local police departments to federal task forces—are under mounting pressure to combat organized crime groups (OCGs) involved in the trafficking and manufacture of deadly drugs like fentanyl. These criminal networks operate across state lines and international borders, making disruption difficult yet critical—in 2023,…
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The ROI of Automated OSINT, Part II: Corporate Security Threat Detection and Investigation
Corporate security teams face an ever-expanding juggling act, tasked with protecting their people, assets, and reputation from insider and external threats. These objectives are like a circus juggling act—if any balls are ignored even for a moment, they could come crashing down. As the size and complexity of this act increases, so too does the need for…
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Tracing Digital Deception: How OSINT Can Stop Falsehoods From Going Viral
There’s a saying often attributed to Mark Twain: “A lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth puts on its shoes.” Whether Mr. Twain actually said that is uncertain (and a potential case of misinformation itself), but what isn’t debatable is that disinformation — false information deliberately created and spread to deceive — and…
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The ROI of Automated OSINT, Part I: Insurance Fraud & Claims Investigations
Insurance companies are built on their margins. They must balance risk and losses against revenue in order to hit their business goals while serving their customers. That’s why achieving positive returns on their investments is so critical for success.
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Preventing and Investigating Workplace Violence with OSINT
Violence is every workplace’s worst nightmare: it disrupts normally safe work environments and can cause lasting harm to employees and businesses. It’s also shockingly common. Each year, roughly 1 in 125 workers in the United States falls victim to violence while on the job. From physical assaults to harassment and intimidation, workplace violence can…
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How OSINT Helps Unmask Dark Web Actors Like Incognito Market’s Mastermind
Earlier this month, a Taiwanese national, 23-year-old Rui-Siang Lin, was arrested on suspicion of owning and running one of the dark web’s most successful drug marketplaces. He now faces charges for drug trafficking, money laundering, and misbranding prescription medication that could result in a life sentence if convicted.
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