Thou shalt not post your illegal activities online! Isn’t that one of the social-media commandments? If not, it should be.

Clearly, those who stormed the Capitol on Jan 6 must’ve missed that tip, and in the rampage’s aftermath, the Internet became one of law enforcement’s go-to resources for identifying and tracking down insurrectionists.

Besides the gigantic physical crime scene, images shared on social media and mobile phone info left a huge digital crime scene. And luckily there’s plenty of people willing to mine the data to help deliver justice.

Loose-knit bands of volunteer Internet sleuths are scouring imagery and data from Jan 6. You can follow the crowd-sourcing gumshoe communities like @SeditionHunters, @SeditionData or @CapitolHunters on Twitter.

It’s a study in contrasts. Imagine the computer gurus, data scientists, concerned citizens and everyday Joes in a virtual battle royal against a red-hatted mob who donned body armour, wrapped themselves in flags and attacked police officers with poles, hockey sticks, baseball bats and bear spray.

Think about the techies staring at computer monitors full of images from that day. The bright light plunges them into rough seas of myth and lies. The manic flag-waving recalls medieval hordes storming a castle, old political rallies, 19th-Century battles or maybe even an ISIS propaganda video.

So far, authorities have charged 43 Texans for their role in the assault that left five dead and at least 140 police officers injured. Texas has the third highest concentration of accused mob members in the country behind Florida with 49 and Pennsylvania with 45.

At least nine of the arrested Texans are from the San Antonio area, and authorities used social media or cell phone location data in most of those cases.

Here’s a rundown of how tech helped roll up the locals involved in the insurrection, according to US Attorney’s records for each case:

San Antonian Samuel Christopher Montoya - who claims to work for Infowars.com, Alex Jones’ right-wing conspiracy theory website - posted a 44-minute video of his experiences that day.

Grady Douglas Owens and his father, Jason Douglas Owens, are from Blanco. Police body-cam footage allegedly shows the younger Owen hit an officer with a skateboard and the elder shove a different officer. The duo also appears in video that a protester posted online.

Police used posts on Facebook, Parler and Twitter, as well as text messages and security camera footage, to identify Elizabeth Rose Williams of Kerrville.

Investigators built their case against Treniss Jewell Evans III of Canyon Lake using Facebook posts, cellphone data and Capitol security camera footage.

Police leveraged Facebook posts to track down San Antonians James “Sonny” Uptmore and his son, Chance Anthony Uptmore. Photos in media coverage from Jan 6 also showed the duo.

Matthew Carl Mazzocco, of San Antonio, pleaded guilty July 2 to a misdemeanor charge related to the insurrection. He posted videos of himself at the US Capitol on Jan 6 on TikTok and Facebook.

And authorities tracked down Alex Kirk Harkrider, of Converse, from Facebook and Snapchat posts.

But the Internet is a fickle realm that both gives and takes away. Now it’s helping at least one of the protesters raise money after losing her job after bragging about being at the Capitol on Jan 6.

The Bexar County Sheriff’s Office fired Lt. Roxanne Mathai, 46, on June 11, for “participating in a protest that evolved into a riot at the Capitol”. Mathai posted selfies and photos from the Capitol grounds but claimed she didn’t enter the building or know rioters were attacking police. In one post, she wrote “aside from my kids this was, indeed, the best day of my life”.

About five months ago, someone created Mathai a profile page on Givesendgo.com, the “#1 Free Christian Crowdfunding Site”, to help “restore Roxanne’s name”, collect money to offset legal fees and “begin a prayer chain”.

Givesendgo is like Gofundme with a shot of religion. It claims to be “the leader in Christian Fundraising”. Apparently, that’s a thing. And more than 100 people have donated US$7,161 .

The donors’ comments are full of messages like this from an anonymous contributor: “God bless Lt. Roxanne Mathai. Sheriff Javier Salazar ought to be ashamed of his conduct.”

And this from someone nicknamed 1A Supporter: “I am so angry this ‘sheriff’ has been abusing his discretion and his office. You have a civil rights lawsuit. Among the several First Amendment rights, is freedom of association.”

You can imagine where those comments go from there.

We can thank social media for identifying many who broke laws at the Capitol on Jan 6, and we should also blame it - in part - for the insurrection, riot, breach, siege, protest or whatever you want to call it.

Police using technology to investigate and build their cases isn’t newsworthy. But the fact that those involved posted so freely about their actions is something we should think about.

Were they so confident that they weren’t worried about potential consequences? Did they not care? Did they think the insurrection would work? Or was it just about the images?

And maybe that’s the scariest thing about all this. These photos and memories aren’t going away anytime soon. They shouldn’t. They belong in history classes and lessons about the fragility of democracy.

Unfortunately, those who think that day was justified are hanging on to the pictures too. They’re part of an alternate history and narrative that we need to beware of.

Luckily, the Internet has a long memory.

 - TNS