How to protect yourself against “doxxing” by antis

Many of us are proud of our involvement in shooting, and don’t want to hide the fact. However, shooting is a divisive issue, and there are those who, for a variety of reasons, would prefer that the wider world didn’t know of their passion. Perhaps your employer is against the practice, or you fear the danger of abuse (online or ‘in real life’), or maybe you just like to keep your pastime a private thing. There have been several high-profile cases in which people have lost jobs or contracts as a result of having their passion revealed against their will.

Some of the more extreme opponents of shooting are well aware of this fact, and are, unsurprisingly, not above using some nefarious techniques in order to further their cause. One technique that is becoming an increasingly popular weapon in their arsenal is “doxxing”. 

What is Doxxing?

This is the practice of using the internet to harvest someone's personal information, and then to consolidate and release that information online. It can be used to incite harassment by disclosing an individual’s contact details and address, or to humiliate and discredit a victim by disclosing sensitive or intimate information. Doxxing can be used to devastating effect to harass, intimidate and humiliate victims and is increasingly used by animal activists to expose individuals who shoot. 

Edmund Sword, insurance broker with Lycetts, has become increasingly aware of the danger in recent months. He told us: 

“One of the biggest changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic was the great global shift to a virtual world and the threat of online fraud and abuse is now omnipresent. Though online activity spiked in the pandemic, a lack of awareness and education on personal cyber protection persists, and individuals are facing evolving threats, in particular activists with links to extreme movements.

Saboteurs are certainly nothing new when it comes to the world of shooting but their tactics have changed. We have witnessed groups becoming more active online and using digital platforms to leak contact information and other personal data, as well as compromising images, so it is more imperative than ever that those who partake in hunting activities protect themselves.”

The American dentist who killed Cecil the Lion and posted about it on social media became the victim of a doxxing attack

How can you protect yourself against a doxxing attack by antis?

If you’re concerned that you, your family, your job or your business would be at risk should you become the victim of such an attack by anti-shooting activists, there are a few steps that you can take to protect yourself. Some of these are seemingly simple, but you would be surprised how many fall into even the most obvious of pitfalls. 

Think before you post on social media

The first thing is to be very circumspect about what you share through your social channels. Even if you don’t have any of the concerns highlighted above, we would suggest that posting images or videos of dead animals is something that should be done with one eye on how those images might appear to someone outside of our world. Does everyone on your Facebook friends list support shooting, or all of your Instagram followers? If you have any concerns at all, simply don’t post the content - if it isn’t online in the first place, the antis can’t use it.

If you really must post about your shooting activities on social media, it pays to make sure that you have selected the most stringent privacy settings in order to maintain control over who sees your posts. You should also look for any historic social media accounts or email accounts that are no longer active and delete them. Legacy accounts may contain contact details or historic posts that are visible to anyone online. If you use multiple platforms, have a username unique to each account.

But there is more to the online world than social media.

Reducing your online footprint

There are a number of public websites that antis can use to glean information about you. However, if you should find information about you on these sites that you would prefer was not there, you can often request that this data is removed or anonymised. These include:

192.com
If you find information that links yourself or immediate family members to your address, you can complete an online CO1 form on behalf of yourself or members of your immediate family at no cost. The information should be removed from the website within 24 hours.

Companies House
If you are a company owner, shareholder or director and your home address is disclosed on the company’s companies house profile, you can have the address provided on the website changed to an alternative address. We recommend that the address is changed to that of your accountant. This can be done by paying a £32 fee and completing an SR01 form.

Planning Applications
All planning applications for properties are available in the public domain for viewing online and cannot be removed. We therefore recommend that any future planning application on your property is named under your architect or interior designer.

Google
The right to be forgotten allows you to compel a search engine to de-list website links from search results for your own name. Search for ‘Personal Information Removal Request Form’. Google will ask you to provide each website link or URL where you traced personal information and ask for the reason why you want it removed.

In the UK, gamekeepers and game farmers, shoots and guns have all suffered doxxing attacks 

Improve your cyber security with these six actions

However, in today’s world, having some sort of online presence is pretty much unavoidable. This means that despite the above, you could still be at risk of a doxxing attack. There are six things you should do to make sure that your data is as safe as possible.

• Use a strong and separate password for your email to all accounts, including banking and social media
• Create strong passwords using three random words and a variety of characters
• Save your passwords in your browser to make sure you do not forget them and to protect against fake websites
• Turn on two-factor authentication (2FA)
• Update your devices regularly with software and security upgrades
• Back up your data on another device or use cloud storage

Get help with improving your cyber-security

Assessing your online footprint and limiting the availability of publicly accessible personal information is imperative, but it can be a time consuming task, and if you’re not an expert, you run the risk of missing something and leaving the potential hackers with an open door. Happily, there are experts out there who can help you with this. “An external agency can ensure extra vigilance and peace of mind, by conducting ‘data scrapes’ on your behalf,” says Edmund. “For example, Lycetts works in partnership with Blackstone Consultancy, whose analysts are experienced in assessing a client’s online footprint, discovering potential online exposures, and reporting on necessary actions. 

We can also offer advice on how to react and deal with the growing threats and subsequent impact of cyber-attacks, through our robust cyber insurance policies. These policies evolve with the fast-paced and highly-disruptive digital environment to ensure that you are properly protected.”

You can contact Edmund to discuss your cyber-security needs by calling him on 01748 900 060 or 07824 611 081, or you can send him an email.