In This Issue
Training: Advanced Human Trafficking Training in San Antonio and Memphis
Operations: Counter Sex Trafficking Operations in Mississippi, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Arkansas
Volunteer Spotlight: Austin Hatch
OSINT Tradecraft: Bookmarklets Basics and Advanced Course
Who We Are
The Skull Games Task Force employs Open Source Intelligence to IDENTIFY sexual predators and their victims, enabling law enforcement to INTERDICT the cycle of abuse. Our mission is to liberate survivors and EMPOWER them with the opportunity for a life of hope, healing, and freedom. The Task Force provides direct support to law enforcement through small teams or as a massive expedition, bringing together the collective capability of more than 400 elite volunteers. This counter-sexual exploitation offensive leverages considerable expertise and resources to fight human trafficking and sexual exploitation. With us as the HUNTERS, we get into the heads of predators, in our own “SKULL GAME”…
Operations Summary – August 2025
by Olinda Cardenas
- Predators Arrested: 33
- Victims Recovered and Offered Assistance: 26
- Individuals Trained in Countertrafficking: 99
August was a blur of momentum for Skull Games Solutions, kicking off with Expedition XVI in Austin, TX. As a native Texan, this one hit close to home, a stark reminder that trafficking does not just happen “somewhere else,” but right here in our own backyards. This expedition stood out for me personally: it was my first time leading a cell team, teaching, guiding, and learning alongside others, while still deep in the hunt myself. It was also memorable because so many volunteers were experiencing their very first task force expedition. A brand-new cohort of OSINT analysts jumped into the HUNT, both in person and remotely, carrying the mission forward with fresh energy.
Training Highlights – August 2025
by Olinda Cardenas
Not long after the Expedition in Austin, Skull Games Solutions made their way to San Antonio, my home city and wrapped up an intensive training in San Antonio with local, state, and federal law enforcement focused on targeting human trafficking and exploitation.
To put new skills into practice, participants were given three hours to investigate four U.S. cities in four different states. In that short window, they identified:
- 23 exploiters
- 22 victim meet locations
- 24 victims
- 7 suspect IDs
That means 24 women were given both a name and a face, proof of the impact trained eyes and sharpened skills can make in just a few hours.
August 19 – 20, Skull Games Solutions delivered Advanced Human Trafficking Training in the Memphis Metro area for state and local officers. Just days later, those skills and strategies were put to the test in a joint operation spanning four states (see the full story in the section ahead).
Operational Support Highlights – August 2025
by Olinda Cardenas
Just days after the Memphis training, the Interstate Justice Coalition (IJC), in partnership with Our Rescue and We Fight Monsters, joined forces with law enforcement to counter sex trafficking efforts across Mississippi, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Arkansas.
For me, this operation carried an added weight. Since joining Skull Games in November 2024, I have set two personal goals: to step into the role of a cell leader and eventually support live operations. Both became reality this month. I was invited to join the Skull Games direct operational support team; and it was eye-opening. Direct operational support is fast-paced, what I like to call “controlled chaos.” Yet, in that chaos, this small team makes it work, producing results, standing shoulder to shoulder with our partners, and providing law enforcement with the critical support they need.
The results were immediate and decisive:
✅ 32 victims of human trafficking identified
➡️ 26 recovered
✅ 12 suspected traffickers identified
➡️ 10 arrests / active cases
✅ 5 exploiters taken into custody
These cases included:
- A registered sex offender who continued exploiting victims.
- An arrest involving the distribution of narcotics to potential victims.
- The safe recovery of an infant after their caretaker fled arrest.
This success was possible only through genuine partnership. A special thanks goes to the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation and the many agencies and organizations that stood shoulder to shoulder in this fight. Lastly, a special recognition goes to DATAPILOT, which provided in-house digital forensics to ensure no piece of evidence was left behind.
Volunteer Spotlight: Austin Hatch
by Olinda Cardenas
This month, we are highlighting one of our newest volunteers, Austin Hatch, who joined Skull Games remotely during Expedition XVI in Austin, TX. No coincidence in the name, Austin logged in from his home base in Southern Idaho, eager to finally take part in the mission he had been watching from afar.
After retiring early from a successful career as a project manager, he shifted his focus to investigative research. He is currently pursuing a degree in Criminal Justice at California Coast University and has completed independent training in legal investigation and Open-Source Intelligence.
Expedition XVI gave him that first chance to step into the fight. When asked how it felt to finally join the task force, Austin said:
“It felt great! I have been looking forward to being on the SK task force for a while, so it was awesome to finally get involved and do some good in the world!”
Even from hundreds of miles away, Austin quickly became part of the team. For him, the expedition was both eye-opening and energizing, and even had advice for anyone interested in joining Skull Games:
“Everyone here is helpful and friendly, and remote communication is not really a hurdle. I would just tell them to gameplan with their investigative partner(s) to limit duplicative efforts. And be sure to document as you go…backtracking for documentation can be a pain, not to mention extremely time-consuming.”
One moment that stood out came from an unexpected teaching moment for Austin:
“After being unable to find any leads for a potential POI, Joe Labrozzi jumped in with a basic Google search and found something in like 30 seconds, saying, ‘I was just doing a few Google searches on the names and “arrested”. That is my desperation mugshot method.’ Cracked me up. But it also shows how everyone here is extremely helpful, and sometimes all it takes is someone outside of your current rabbit hole to find new ones to climb into.”
When asked what the most rewarding part of the experience was, Austin mentioned:
“Putting a name and a face to the victim. It felt like a step towards helping her rediscover her true self. That is why we do it, right?”
Austin’s story reminds us that the fight against trafficking stretches across every state and every background. Whether in person or online, each volunteer adds vital strength to the mission.
Task Force Expedition XVI was a success, with 52 hunters helping identify 25 real victims and 13 persons of interest in 16 hours.
OSINT Tradecraft: Bookmarklets Basics and Advanced Course
by Tom Phelan
If you’ve ever copied a domain, IP, or username into a dozen different tools, you know the pain. OSINT work often involves running the same data point across multiple services: WHOIS lookups, names, phones, and image reverse searches. Doing that manually eats time and focus that should be spent on analysis. To counter this you can use an OSINT app, extension, or the somewhat unknown bookmarklet.
What’s a Bookmarklet?
A bookmarklet is a browser bookmark that runs a small bit of JavaScript when you click it. Instead of just navigating to a link, it can:
- Ask you for a datapoint (like a username or phone number), and it can open multiple websites, plug in the datapoint, and search it for you.
- Take what you’ve highlighted on a page (like a username or email) and fire it into several search engines.
- Scrape the website you’re on for a specific type of data point (like a username or phone number).
Pretty cool, right?
Think of the amount of time this could save you in scrolling, reading, copy-pasting, and opening and closing tabs. This is especially useful if you are setting up a new workstation or browser account: there’s no OSINT software, application, or extension purchasing or installing. You just import the bookmarklets like bookmarks. But we’ll get to that—
Bookmarklets vs. Other Tools
You might ask what’s the difference between an installed OSINT software/application, a browser extension, and a bookmarklet? OSINT software and applications are typically the best in terms of capability. Still, they usually come with a price tag, so if you are paying for a product like NexusXplore that can do everything you could do with browser searches, all in one place, stick with that. Same for if you meticulously coded your own programs to automate your OSINT. Bookmarklets bring you near that capability, but are not as powerful. Bookmarklets are more like browser extensions, which are like an app installed in your browser that you can run on the pages you’re browsing. Bookmarklets are very simple compared to those tools, in that they’re basically like clicking multiple bookmarks and inputting data all at once.
| Bookmarklets | Extensions |
| Tiny (just JavaScript saved as a bookmark) | Installed packages with more features |
| Run only when clicked. | Can run in the background |
| Easy to share/save, no install needed | Installation and system requirements |
| Lower profile (no constant permissions) | More powerful (can automate, scrape wider) |
| FREE (generally) | Pricetag for premium services |
Where to Get OSINT Bookmarklets
You don’t need to write your own: there are excellent collections already built and maintained. You can throw the bookmarklet type you need in your search engine, or check out:
- training Tools
A free, well-maintained collection of OSINT bookmarklets covering domains, IPs, usernames, images, and more. Each bookmarklet is ready to drag into your bookmark bar. - GitHub OSINT Bookmarklet Repositories
Community-maintained bookmarklet packs. Great if you like tinkering or want to keep a toolbox you can update over time.
How to Set Up Bookmarklets
Let’s do an example bookmarklet set up using myOSINT.training tools
Step 1: Go to myosint.training.
Step 2. Find the bookmarklet you want.
Step 3: Drag the link directly to your bookmarks bar.
Step 4: Done. When you click it, it will either prompt you for an input (like a domain name) or it will use the page you’re on / text you highlighted.
⚠️ WARNING: If nothing happens when you click, check your browser’s pop-up settings and allow them for the site.
Step 5: Your search will then populate by opening multiple browser tabs for as many sites as were built into the bookmarklet.
Step 6: Set up your new bookmarklets bar to have a logical flow, binned by type of search. You could use folders, or, like in the example below, dividers to organize.
This concludes the Bookmarklets basic course! If this is good enough for you and you have no interest in trying to code your own bookmarklet, thanks for reading! 👋
Bookmarklets Advanced Course
For the hardcore OSINT nerds, let’s code our own bookmarklet:
Bookmarklets use JavaScript to tell your browser to execute a command instead of navigate to a link. More specifically, you are telling the browser to.
- Run a JavaScript function, i.e., JavaScript:(function(){
- Use a fillable prompt or search the page you’re on for something, i.e., var query = window.getSelection().toString();
- Open a new window and input the data into the site open(“https://www.google.com/search?q=” + encodeURIComponent(query), “_blank”);
Basically, you’re telling the browser: IF I highlight or input text THEN open this other tab and input the data. Here’s an example of a custom bookmarklet that searches highlighted text on Google and Yandex simultaneously.
javascript:(function(){
// Gets the highlighted text off the page
var query = window.getSelection().toString();
// Stops the script if nothing is highlighted
if(!query) return;
// Opens Google and Yandex searches in new tabs
window.open(“https://www.google.com/search?q=” + encodeURIComponent(query), “_blank”);
window.open(“https://yandex.com/search/?text=” + encodeURIComponent(query), “_blank”);
})();
To make this code work as a bookmarklet:
Step 1: Copy the code. It usually works better to convert the JavaScript to a single line of code (but it’s not always necessary). Single-line looks like this (You take all the breaks out):
javascript:(function(){var query=window.getSelection().toString();if(!query)return;window.open(“https://www.google.com/search?q=”+encodeURIComponent(query),”_blank”);window.open(“https://yandex.com/search/?text=”+encodeURIComponent(query),”_blank”);})();
Step 2: Create a new bookmark for your browser.
Step 3: Input the JavaScript as the URL for your bookmark.
Step 4: Name it and save it.
Step 5: Remember to turn off your pop-up blocker before executing it!
Step 6: Highlight something and click the bookmarklet.
Step 7: It works! (Go Phils)
Here’s another one that could be valuable, specifically to our Skull Games Task Force members: a bookmarklet that searches a username on both Instagram and TikTok.
javascript:(function(){
// 1. Asks the user to enter a username
var username = prompt(“Enter username:”);
// 2. Stops the script if the user cancels or leaves it blank
if(!username) return;
// 3. Builds the URLs for Instagram and TikTok profiles with the input username
var instagramURL = “https://www.instagram.com/” + encodeURIComponent(username);
var tiktokURL = “https://www.tiktok.com/@” + encodeURIComponent(username);
// 4. Opens Instagram and TikTok in new tabs
.open(instagramURL, “_blank”);
window.open(tiktokURL, “_blank”);
})();
Translate to a single line:
javascript:(function(){var u=prompt(“Enter username:”);if(!u)return;window.open(“https://www.instagram.com/”+encodeURIComponent(u),”_blank”);window.open(“https://www.tiktok.com/@”+encodeURIComponent(u),”_blank”);})();
Save to bookmark and execute. It should pop up a prompt like this:
Good to go! You now know the two primary ways OSINT bookmarklets are coded in JavaScript. Switching or adding targeted websites is pretty easy from here. You can also refer back to those GitHub examples for inspiration for your bookmarklet tweaks. Happy Hunting!
Upcoming Events
- Task Force Expedition XVII | October 18-19 | Dallas, TX
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About the Author
Tom Phelan is an active-duty U.S. Army Intelligence Officer with over five years of experience in OSINT and a dedicated volunteer for Skull Games Task Force.
Olinda Cardenas is a former crime scene investigator turned cybercrime enthusiast. She specializes in OSINT and financial crime investigations and is a dedicated volunteer with Skull Games
