The Instagram Impersonator: How a Stolen Identity Became a Weapon

Our hosts examine the chilling 2019 case of Sarah Mitchell, whose stolen social media photos were used to create dozens of fake dating profiles targeting vulnerable individuals. The episode details how the predator used sophisticated data scraping tools to build a complete digital clone of Sarah's life, leading to a year-long campaign of harassment affecting both Sarah and secondary victims who were scammed using her identity. Through digital forensics analysis, we explore how the perpetrator exploited Instagram's image metadata and location tagging features, while examining the legal challenges that arose when the crimes crossed multiple state jurisdictions. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.