Until a few months ago, Stephen Miller was just an anonymous bureaucrat in the Trump administration. However, thanks to his role as a key architect of the zero tolerance border policy, everyone now knows the political adviser’s name. What’s more, a lot of people have his personal phone number.

On Wednesday, Splinter, a news site owned by Univision, published Miller’s cell phone number, stating: “The Trump administration’s policy of separating immigrant children from their families has been credited primarily to the strenuous efforts of White House adviser Stephen Miller. Perhaps you would like to call him about it.”

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Miller wasn’t the only person involved in Trump’s family separation policy to have his personal information publicized. Earlier this week Sam Lavigne, an artist and adjunct professor at NYU, created a database containing the LinkedIn information of over 1,500 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) employees.

Publicizing people’s personal information without their consent, typically with the aim of inconveniencing or intimidating them, is known as “doxxing”. It’s not a new practice but while it used to be largely confined to squabbles between hackers, it’s now very much in the mainstream and is becoming an increasingly common tactic used by both the left and the right.

After the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville last year, for example, where 32-year-old Heather Heyer was killed while counter-protesting, a Twitter account called @YesYoureRacist kicked off a campaign to identify the “Nazis marching”. One of the first demonstrators to be identified was Cole White, who worked at a fast food restaurant in California. His employer, Top Dog, was bombarded by inquiries about White, who soon resigned from his job over the incident.

Yes, You're Racist (@YesYoureRacist) If you recognize any of the Nazis marching in #Charlottesville, send me their names/profiles and I'll make them famous #GoodNightAltRight pic.twitter.com/2tA9xliFVU

Another marcher identified by Heather Heyer was Peter Tefft. After his outing, his father disowned him in a viral letter. “I, along with all of his siblings and his entire family, wish to loudly repudiate my son’s vile, hateful and racist rhetoric and actions,” Pearce Tefft wrote in a letter to the Forum newspaper. “We do not know specifically where he learned these beliefs. He did not learn them at home.”

Leftwing proponents of doxxing argue that publicly naming and shaming neo-Nazis or people who are drumming up hatred, sends a message that that sort of behavior is socially unacceptable. During a time when the president is emboldening bigots with inflammatory rhetoric and inhumane laws, doxxing is a way of ensuring that people know that there are still consequences for unacceptable behavior. And there is certainly evidence that you can shame people into doing the right thing: the Trump administration has backtracked their family separation policy after weeks of intense criticism. We can’t know how much more personal attacks, such as doxxing, and protesters targeting the US homeland security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, while she was eating at a Mexican restaurant, played a role in that decision.

Play Video 0:55 Protesters confront US homeland security secretary in Mexican restaurant – video

Even if doxxing may dissuade some neo-Nazis from spewing hatred, it remains a highly dubious practice. When used by the left it’s also easy for the right to play the victim. Indeed, the release of Miller’s phone number and Sam Lavigne’s database of Ice employees has angered many on the right, who view it as harassment. Online platforms like Medium, Github and Twitter also view it as harassment, and have censored posts which link to the Ice employees information and Miller’s phone number. This, in turn, has angered many on the left, who point to double standards. Indeed, as the Splinter article itself mentions, Trump has a history of publishing the personal information of people he doesn’t like including the phone numbers of the Univision anchor Jorge Ramos and the Republican primary opponent Lindsey Graham.

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Doxxers also often get things wrong. In 2013 Reddit wrongly identified the Brown University student Sunil Tripathi of being the Boston Marathon bomber and his family was subject to a barrage of hate. When it was clear Tripathi had no role in the bombing, Reddit released a statement apologizing for its role in the misinformation. “Though started with noble intentions, some of the activity on Reddit fuelled online witch hunts and dangerous speculation which spiralled into very negative consequences for innocent parties,” the post stated. Tripathi was later found dead; the 22-year-old had been suffering from depression and killed himself.



Triparthi is far from being the only victim of misinformation. After the Charlottesville protest Kyle Quinn, who runs a lab at the University of Arkansas dedicated to wound-healing research, was wrongly identified by internet sleuths as a participant in the rightwing rally. He was inundated with angry comments and his home address was posted on social networks.