West Newsmagazine 5-20-20
Local news, local politics and community events for West St. Louis County Missouri.
Local news, local politics and community events for West St. Louis County Missouri.
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12 I NEWS I<br />
May <strong>20</strong>, <strong>20</strong><strong>20</strong><br />
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By JESSICA MESZAROS<br />
In the early morning hours of May 1,<br />
the Ballwin Police Department shut down<br />
Holloway Road in response to a reported<br />
police tip about a barricaded subject inside<br />
a local residence. The tip was reported to<br />
the department’s 911 call center, but after<br />
authorities responded to the home in question,<br />
it was quickly discerned that the tip<br />
had been a hoax.<br />
This form of online harassment is known<br />
as “swatting.” It occurs when an anonymous<br />
individual prank calls or sends a fake<br />
tip to an emergency service that results in<br />
the dispatch of police and emergency service<br />
response teams to another person’s<br />
address. In extreme cases, armed law<br />
enforcement officers or a SWAT team may<br />
be sent in to investigate the claim, hence<br />
the name.<br />
The victim of the call, as is the case with<br />
many similar cases, was cleared of any suspicion<br />
and not charged.<br />
According to Ballwin Public Information<br />
Officer Scott Stephens, the victims<br />
of these attacks, including the most recent<br />
one, are usually online gamers that become<br />
involved in heated discourse or trash talk<br />
on servers or in online chat rooms.<br />
“They [swatting calls] are pretty popular<br />
throughout the country,” Stephens said.<br />
“Most of the time, it happens through or<br />
originates from video game chats. We personally<br />
don’t get them a lot here, which is<br />
good, but we are aware of them.”<br />
While this is not the first swatting call<br />
the department has received, it is the only<br />
one reported to the department during the<br />
COVID-19 quarantine.<br />
“This is the first one we’ve seen in quite<br />
a while,” Stephens said.<br />
The origin of the call, in the early morning<br />
hours of May 1, is still being investigated<br />
by Ballwin detectives. While the<br />
fake call came through the department’s<br />
phone line, these fake tips can also be submitted<br />
via email or even via social media<br />
channels like Facebook.<br />
Sometimes, swatting calls can be a<br />
result of doxing. Doxing is another form<br />
of harassment where the private information<br />
of an online user, such as their phone<br />
number or home address, is leaked publicly<br />
online. This information can include<br />
details such as someone’s real name and<br />
financial records.<br />
According to Stephens, swatting calls<br />
are rarely one-off situations. They usually<br />
occur between two individuals who are<br />
aware of each other. He added that there’s<br />
not necessarily a [target] age demographic.<br />
“Any of these games that we see where<br />
there’s trash talk or anything like that,<br />
that’s what tends to get out of hand, and it<br />
goes from there,” Stephens said.<br />
In some cases, swatting is possible<br />
when individuals share too much personal<br />
information online. Other times, it is made<br />
possible when the offenders use malicious<br />
means to backtrace an individual’s location<br />
or account registration details via hacking<br />
techniques or software.<br />
This means that, while swatting calls<br />
and other forms of online harassment are<br />
hardly random, they can literally occur<br />
from anywhere in the world.<br />
“These calls come from around the country,<br />
sometimes from the other side of the<br />
world,” Stephens said. “Our world is a lot<br />
more connected than it used to be. Especially<br />
for our younger people and people<br />
involved in online worlds. Some of their<br />
closest friends are people they have never<br />
met before or in-person. Sometimes this<br />
can be a one-off, but typically not. Usually,<br />
See ONLINE SAFETY, page 37
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