What to do if you get doxxed
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Doxing, or doxxing (from "dox", abbreviation of documents), is the Internet-based practice of researching and publicly broadcasting private or identifying information (especially personally identifying information) about an individual or organization.[1][2][3][4][5][6] The methods employed to acquire this information include searching publicly available databases and social media websites (like Facebook), hacking, and social engineering. It is closely related to Internet vigilantism and hacktivism.
Doxing may be carried out for various reasons, including inflicting harm, harassment, online shaming, extortion, coercion, business analysis, risk analytics, aiding law enforcement or vigilante versions of justice
Etymology
"Doxing" is a neologism that has evolved over its brief history. It comes from a spelling alteration of the abbreviation "docs" (for "documents") and refers to "compiling and releasing a dossier of personal information on someone".[9] Essentially, doxing is revealing and publicizing the records of an individual, which were previously private or difficult to obtain.
The term dox derives from the slang "dropping dox" which, according to Wired writer Mat Honan, was "an old-school revenge tactic that emerged from hacker culture in 1990s". Hackers operating outside the law in that era used the breach of an opponent's anonymity as a means to expose opponents to harassment or legal repercussions.[9]
Consequently, doxing often comes with a negative connotation because it can be a vehicle for revenge via the violation of privacy
Common techniques
Once people have been exposed through doxing, they may be targeted for harassment through methods such as harassment in person, fake signups for mail and pizza deliveries, or through swatting (dispatching armed police to their house through spoofed tips).
A hacker may obtain an individual's dox without making the information public. A hacker may look for this information in order to extort or coerce a known or unknown target. Also, a hacker may harvest a victim's information in order to break into his Internet accounts or to take over their social media accounts.[9]
The victim may also be shown his details as proof that they have been doxed as a form of intimidation. The perpetrator may use this fear to gain power over the victim in order to extort or coerce. Doxing is therefore a standard tactic of online harassment and has been used by people associated with 4chan and in the Gamergate and vaccine controversies
Legal Remedies
There are currently few legal remedies for the victims of doxing.[58] In the United States, there are currently two federal laws that could potentially address the problem of doxing: the Interstate Communications Statute and the Interstate Stalking Statute.[59] However, as one scholar has argued, "[t]hese statutes...are woefully inadequate to prevent doxing because their terms are underinclusive and they are rarely enforced."[59] The Interstate Communications Statute, for example, "only criminalizes explicit threats to kidnap or injure a person."[60] But in many instances of doxing, a doxer may never convey an explicit threat to kidnap or injure, but the victim could still have good reason to be terrified.[60] And the Interstate Stalking Statute "is rarely enforced and it serves only as a hollow protection from online harassment."[61] To illustrate, over three million people are stalked over the internet each year, yet only three people are charged under the Interstate Stalking Statute.[61] Accordingly, "[t]his lack of federal enforcement means that the States must step in if doxing is to be reduced."[61]
South Korea stands as one of few countries with criminal statute that specifically addresses doxing. Article 49 of "Act on promotion of information and communications network utilization, and information protection" prohibits unlawful collection and dissemination of private information such as full name, birth date, address, likeliness, and any other information that is deemed sufficient to identify specific person(s) when viewed in summation, regardless of intent.[62] Other statute also prohibits insulting an individual with language derogatory or profane in nature, and defamation of an individual through dissemination of either misinformation or privileged factual information that may potentially damage an individual's personal reputation or honor. Article 44 of the same act introduced a specific statute, criminalizing defamation through digital media with harsher maximum sentence than usual defamation.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxing