Google is a fantastic resource for OSINT. Often things as simple as searching for your target yields spectacular results. This is often my starting point in intelligence gathering. Remember to use Cached results whenever possible to conceal your identity.
Exact matches help narrow things down when you have thousands of results. Enclosing items such as names and email addresses in quotation marks helps pinpoint your search results:
- Exact match: "Firstname Lastname"
- Email addresses: "[email protected]"
Searching for a term on a specific site or domain:
- site:localnewssite.com "Firstname Lastname"
Search for specific file types:
- filetype:pdf "default password"
Do not show results matching a pattern:
- droberson -Twitter