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Verification: If your mother tweets she loves you, check it out

For guides, tip sheets and more, visit Global Investigative Journalism Network GIJN.ORG IRE.ORG

GENERAL

Google Advanced Search

Wolfram Alpha Searches web for authoritative answers to factual questions, historical weather data, much more

SOCIAL MEDIA SEARCHES

FACEBOOK:Facebook | Searchisback.com |  Stalkscan.com   

TWITTER: Followerwonk Analyze people’s followers by location, topic, more + first Tweet (free for limited searches) | Klout Analyze influence | Tweetdeck | Twicsy Search what Twitpix a user has posted | Twitter Advanced Search | Twitter search terms | Who tweeted it first? | $ Picodash Instagram and Twitter searches for photos, videos, users and locations | $ Trendsmap Mapping by words, hashtags, users

SOCIAL MEDIA MONITORING

AIDR platform Disaster-based

$ Ban.jo Location-based

$ Geofeedia Location-based

Ushahidi Crowd-sourcing software

VERIFYING IMAGES

Reveye — Chrome extension that combines reverse image search engines of TinEye, Google, Bing and others

TinEye Web image searcher – Drag an image or url into the search box and find out when it first appeared on the Web

Google Image Search (b&w works best)

Findexif.com Get the data from a photo that tells where/when/how it was taken

Foto Forensics

Freeocr Reads, translates text in images

Jeffrey’s Exif Viewer Get the data from a photo that tells where/when/how it was taken

JPEGSnoop

SunCalc Date/time shadow calcs

MAPS & LOCATION IMAGES

Flikr |  free-ocr.com |  Google Maps |  Google Translate |  Instantstreetview

NASA Earth Observatory |   Wikimapia

PEOPLE BACKGROUNDING

Facebook | rchisback.com |  Stalkscan.com   

GeoSocial Footprint Check your social media footprint

Flickr Geo-located photos

Identify Combined web identity (Firefox)

$ Full Contact Info from Web on people who email you (Gmail)

Linkedin

Numberway Phone #s

Person Finder Finding family/friends in a disaster

PIpl

Rapportive LinkedIn info on people who email you(Gmail)

SearchSystems.net Public records links

Spokeo People locators by name, address, phone

WebMii Profile search engine

WHOIS Website ownership

TRUTH-SQUADDING

Bellingcat

Snopes.com

Storyful

CASE STUDIES

Finding Dylann Roof by Storyful

How Storyful verified crowd-sourced video of the Boston Bombing in real time by AJR

How to Debunk a Geopolitcal Rumor with Your Twitter Followers by Andy Carvin