After a day of work at the Engineering Research Center at the University of Arkansas, Kyle Quinn had a pleasant Friday night in Bentonville, Arkansas, with his wife and a colleague. They explored an exhibition at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and dined at an upscale restaurant.
Then on Saturday, he discovered that social media sleuths had incorrectly identified him as a participant in a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Overnight, thousands of strangers across the country had been working together to share photographs of the men bearing torches on the University of Virginia campus. They wanted to name and shame them to their employers, friends and neighbours. In a few cases, they succeeded.
But Quinnâs experience showed the risks.
A man at the rally had been photographed wearing an âArkansas Engineeringâ shirt, and the amateur investigators found a photo of Quinn that looked somewhat similar. They were both bearded and had similar builds.
By internet frenzy standards, that was proof enough.
Quinn, who runs a laboratory dedicated to wound-healing research, was quickly flooded with vulgar messages on Twitter and Instagram, he said in an interview Monday. Countless people he had never met demanded he lose his job, accused him of racism and posted his home address on social networks.
Fearing for their safety, he and his wife stayed with a colleague this weekend.
For someone whose only sin was a passing resemblance to someone else, Quinn bore the direct consequences of the reckless spread of misinformation in breaking news, a common ritual in modern news events.
The practice of publicly identifying someone, often with sensitive personal details like addresses, phone numbers and employer information, is known as âdoxxing.â
Mark Popejoy, an art director in Bentonville, attempted to correct dozens of Twitter accounts that had inaccurately pegged Quinn as the rally participant.
While some appreciated the new information, others adamantly refused to change their minds, he said Monday.
âI think itâs dangerous just to go out accusing people without any kind of confirmation of who they are,â he said. âIt can ruin peopleâs lives.â
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