Profile Discovery by Username

inputs: username | outputs: list of profiles associated with that username

Testing Methodology

  1. 1.
    check the same username (i.e. cham423) using each tool
    • count the number of profiles discovered
    • count number of false positives (nonexistent profiles, not mismatches)
  2. 2.
    rate difficulty of deployment
  3. 3.
    rate quality of output
  4. 4.
    rate development health
  5. 5.
    rate automation potential
see the template at the bottom of the page if you are adding a new tool.

CLI Pick

Sherlock

Example Results

python3 sherlock.py cham423 -o cham423.out
  • 38 total results
  • 0 false positives!
  • 7 results were not the target, but were valid accounts

Deployment

  • python (medium difficulty)
  • has a docker container as a fallback

Output

  • basically stdout, no JSON output option -- a list of discovered profile urls

Development Health

  • very healthy, recent commits, large number of contributors, long history

Automation Potential

  • very high, command line tool that supports input lists
  • <todo> not tested at scale. from a single host, would likely encounter rate limiting when enumerating large numbers of profiles

Web Pick: whatsmyname.app

Example Results

  • 34 total results
  • 0 false positives!

Deployment

  • easy, web hosted

Output

  • Clickable links, clipboard copy, excel, CSV, PDF

Development Health

  • Well supported/maintained.

Automation Potential

  • No captcha. there is an accompanying CLI tool, but it doesn't seem to function as well, with more false positive

Other Tools

WhatsMyName

Example Results

python3 whats_my_name.py -u cham423 -o cham423.out
  • 114 total results
  • 75 false positives! (65% false positive rate)
Note: I am not sure why the CLI version of this tool has so many false positives. The web-hosted version (whatsmyname.app) is excellent.

Deployment

  • python (medium difficulty)

Output

  • file output was broken at time of testing (2022-09-18)
  • stdout is printed in table form with lots of extra spaces/characters, and some profile links are cut off

Development Health

  • good

Automation Potential

  • medium -- this project is used by many projects for its JSON list of profile urls, which can be imported to check usernames automatically. the false positive rate is alarming

Namechk (web)

Example Results

  • 25 total results
  • 1 false positive

Deployment

  • web hosted (easy difficulty)
  • 1-5 clicks to full results

Output

  • No file output
  • Profile links to signup/about pages, not valid profiles

Development Health

  • unknown (third party)

Automation Potential

  • very limited: captcha + cloudflare would prevent easy scraping

namecheckr

Example Results

  • 12 total results
  • 1 false positives

Output

  • no file output
  • site links point to root page, not profile link

Development Health

  • unknown (third party)

Automation Potential

  • no CAPTCHA, so could be scraped

UserSearch.org

Example Results

  • 15 total results
  • 1 false positive

Deployment

  • web hosted (easy difficulty)
  • requires 10+ clicks to see all sites, no single page with all results

Output

  • no file output
  • profile links available in search results, but not on single page

Development Health

  • unknown (third party)

Automation Potential

  • no CAPTCHA, could potentially be scraped

NameCheckup

Example Results

  • 14 total results
  • 1 false positive

Deployment

  • web hosted (easy difficulty)
  • 1-5 clicks to results

Output

  • no file output
  • results link to specific profiles

Development Health

  • unknown (third party)

Automation Potential

  • no CAPTCHA, could potentially be scraped

CheckUsernames

Example Results

  • 42 total results
  • 27 false positives
  • 79 errors checking target site

Deployment

  • web hosted (easy difficulty)
  • 1-5 clicks to results

Output

  • no file output
  • profile links are to individual profile, not to root page which is nice

Development Health

  • unknown (third party)

Automation Potential

  • no CAPTCHA, could potentially be scraped

Namechk (script)

This tool is not currently functional as of 2022-09-18, and returns all false positives due to Cloudflare bot protection

Example Output

Todo

Template

<link to tool>

Example Results

  • n total results
  • n false positives

Deployment

Output

  • <describe output options>

Development Health

  • <describe project health>

Automation Potential

  • <describe automation potential>