Police Have A New Tool to Solve Crimes: Social Media
According to this article, in today’s society the average American has both cell phones, and social media accounts. Although individuals may not think twice about these entities, the police do. Cell phones and social media are helping police solve crime. During the May Day Riot of last year, there was a group of destructive individuals who disrupted property, and assaulted others. Many people there had filmed, and took pictures of these individuals destroying properties. For instance in this video Seattle May Day Mayhem! You can see certain individuals breaking windows, and setting off smoke bombs.
How do they use social media?
From this video, the police can watch, and look for “unique characteristics” such as the suspect height, body type, and even shoes a suspect is wearing. In the May Day Mayhem case,police were able to identify 5 suspects from YouTube, Flickr, as well as Twitter.
In one instance, there was a viral photo of a group of people breaking a window of the American Eagle Outfitter’s downtown. While analyzing this picture, the police had noticed a distinctive hole on one of the suspect’s shoe. Police then searched through social media accounts to discover a man wearing the same shoe, relaxing with his friends in downtown Seattle.
As one can see, social media is becoming an apparatus for police. It is helping solve crime, whether an individuals know it or not.
