Social media video content is an important part of any investigation or analyst’s work. The platforms that host videos can rapidly take down content based on their policies, which are not universal & are at the discretion of the platform. Additionally, users of the platforms are also in control of their content & can remove it without notice.

This leads to a key requirement where investigators & analysts need to be able to download content offline for further analysis & to often preserve evidence that applies to any number of use-cases. Being able to do this without reliance on web-hosted or 3rd party tools gives us confidence in always being able to achieve the download, whilst reducing privacy and attribution concerns that an investigator might have which is introduced when using 3rd party tools as they often rely on advertising revenue to stay online. Note: trademark & copyright laws should be adhered to at all times, so be aware of your actions & OSINT Combine takes no responsibility for any actions as a result of using these techniques.

We are going to learn the guiding principle which will allow you to target most platforms that host video content, and then walk-through how to do this on Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, TikTok & YouTube simply to demonstrate the approach.