Level 1: Analyst – Course Three: Social Media & Digital Platform Investigations

Unlock the secrets behind the screens. This course explores mainstream social media platforms through an investigative lens, teaching you how to gather intel, attribute activity, and uncover key details across the most-used platforms in the world.

Key Objectives:

• Investigate mainstream platforms (Facebook, X, Instagram, Reddit, etc.)
• Understand patterns in user attribution and identity inference
• Learn core social media investigative workflows

Topics:

1. Introduction to Social Media Investigations
   • Understand how each platform operates and what data is publicly accessible.
2. Investigating Facebook
   • Learn to trace posts, friends, photos, and activity timelines.
3. Investigating Facebook Marketplace
   • Identify seller identities and track item postings through investigative clues
4. Investigating Instagram
   • Extract insights from bios, hashtags, image content, and tagged locations.
5. Investigating X (formerly Twitter)
   • Track account creation, user behavior, follower networks, and timelines.
6. Investigating TikTok
   • Understand short-form content tracking and audio-based trend tracing.
7. Investigating Reddit Part 1
   • Map activity across subreddits, user histories, and conversation threads
8. Investigating Reddit Part 2
   • Put theory into practice using realworld Reddit scenarios – safely, ethically, and effectively.
9. Investigating LinkedIn
   • Profile professional identities, work history, and company connections.
10. Investigating Snapchat
    • Learn what’s recoverable through usernames, Snap Maps, and linked content.
11. Investigating Multimedia
    • Analyze shared videos, images, and sound for embedded metadata and origins.
12. Searching Video Platforms
    • Learn to find user-generated content and filter by date, type, and region.
13. Investigating Message Groups & Forums
    • Locate, access, and investigate private or fringe communities and discussion boards.
14. Social Media Analysis & Attribution Basics
    • Correlate behavior patterns and content clues to identify real-world actors.
15. Analysis & Attribution Demo
    • Observe the principles of account attribution, data correlation and triangulation in action across multiple platforms.

* To be awarded the OSINT Analyst Certification, learners must successfully complete all three Analyst-level courses and pass the final certification exam. Partial completion does not qualify for certification.