Insurance carriers monitor social media routinely in serious injury cases. They also hire investigators to conduct physical surveillance. These are not occasional tactics reserved for suspected fraud. They are standard tools used in the evaluation of every claim involving significant damages across New York City and Long Island. The carrier is not looking for evidence of fraud. It is looking for evidence that your injuries are less severe than you claim — and social media and surveillance are the most effective ways to find it.
Most injured people do not realize how early this monitoring begins. The decision to place a claimant under surveillance is often made within the first few weeks of the claim, particularly when the reported injuries are serious, when the claimant is claiming significant lost wages, or when the damages demand exceeds the policy minimum. By the time the lawsuit is filed and the deposition is scheduled, the carrier may already have months of surveillance footage and a complete archive of the claimant’s social media activity.
What the carrier looks for on social media
The carrier reviews your publicly available social media profiles — Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, X, YouTube — looking for posts, photographs, videos, and activity that appear inconsistent with your claimed limitations. A photograph of you at a family barbecue when you testified you cannot socialize due to pain. A post about a weekend trip when you claimed the 90/180 day disability under Section 5102(d). A check-in at a gym — even if you were only there to watch your child’s gymnastics class. A video showing you dancing at a wedding. A vacation photo on a beach. A post about returning to the gym “finally” after months off.
The carrier does not need the evidence to be fair or in context. It only needs the evidence to raise a question about credibility. A photograph of you smiling at a birthday party does not mean your back does not hurt. But the carrier will use it to argue that it does. Once credibility is questioned, the entire claim is devalued — and credibility is the most valuable asset in any personal injury case.
The carrier also looks at posts that pre-date the accident. If you posted frequently about gym workouts, hiking trips, and physical activities before the accident, and then posted nothing about those activities after, the before-and-after contrast may support your claim. If you posted the same activities before and after, the contrast cuts the other way. The carrier examines the full timeline.
Surveillance and social media work together
Insurance carriers combine social media monitoring with physical surveillance in a coordinated effort. An investigator may follow you based on a social media post suggesting you will be at a particular location. A post about attending your niece’s soccer game on Saturday tells the investigator where to be and when. If the investigator captures video of you walking without apparent difficulty, lifting a cooler into your car, or standing for an extended period, that footage goes into the defense file alongside the social media post.
The combination creates a narrative the defense can tell the jury: the claimant posted publicly about attending this event, the investigator observed the claimant at the event performing activities that are inconsistent with the limitations claimed in the lawsuit, and the medical records during the same week show the claimant told their doctor they could not perform those activities. That narrative is devastating even when the underlying injury is real, because it attacks the claimant’s credibility rather than the medical evidence.
What surveillance captures and how it is used
The investigator typically records you leaving your home, walking to your car, driving, shopping, running errands, pumping gas, and any other public activity you perform during the surveillance window. The footage does not need to show you doing anything dramatic. You carrying a bag of groceries when you testified you cannot lift more than ten pounds. You bending to pick something up when you claimed you cannot bend at the waist. You walking without an apparent limp when your doctor documented an antalgic gait. You reaching overhead when your records show restricted shoulder range of motion.
Each observation becomes evidence. There is no good explanation that can overcome the eye of the camera. If the footage contradicts your testimony, the jury believes the camera. Juries understand that people sometimes exaggerate and sometimes forget. They do not interpret video footage charitably when it contradicts sworn testimony. The defense attorney plays the surveillance video at trial during cross-examination, pauses on the incriminating moments, and lets the jury draw the conclusion. The argument does not need to be made. The video makes it.
Surveillance is typically conducted in multi-day periods scheduled around events the carrier believes will produce useful footage: the day of a doctor’s visit, the day of a deposition, a weekend, a holiday, the day of a claimed medical milestone. Investigators work in shifts and use multiple vehicles to avoid detection. You may not notice you are being followed. Assume you are.
How to handle social media during your case
The safest approach is to stop posting entirely during the pendency of your case. If that is not realistic, follow strict rules. Do not post about the accident, the case, your injuries, your treatment, or the insurance process. Do not post photographs showing you engaged in physical activities of any kind. Do not post about travel, events, concerts, weddings, or outings. Do not check in at locations. Do not let friends or family tag you in their posts.
Review your privacy settings, but understand that privacy settings are not a guarantee. The defense can seek social media content through discovery in litigation, and courts in New York have generally allowed discovery of relevant social media content even from private accounts when a threshold showing of relevance is made. The safest assumption is that anything posted anywhere may eventually be seen by the carrier.
Do not delete posts after the case begins. Deleting evidence after litigation is anticipated can create a spoliation issue that is significantly worse than the post itself. If you want to clean up your profile, do it before you are represented and before litigation is contemplated. Once the case is active, leave the profile as it is and stop adding to it.
Follow Doctor's Orders
Follow the medical restrictions you have been given. If your doctor says no lifting over ten pounds, do not carry heavy bags. If your doctor restricts bending, do not garden. If your doctor limits you to sedentary work, do not help a friend move furniture. This is not about performing for a camera. It is about living consistently with your documented condition. An investigator capturing you violating your restrictions is evidence the carrier will use to argue your actual function is better than your reported function — which reduces the value of the case regardless of whether the injury is real.
If you can do more than your restrictions suggest, tell your doctor so the restrictions can be updated. Accurate restrictions that you follow are far more defensible than overstated restrictions that you violate on camera. A medical record that accurately reflects your function — what you can do, what you cannot do, and what causes pain — is far stronger evidence than a record that overstates your limitations and invites surveillance to contradict it.
Accuracy in the medical record prevents surveillance problems
The best defense against surveillance is a medical record that accurately reflects your limitations. If your medical records describe you as having moderate, specific limitations — you can lift 15 pounds but not 50, you can walk half a mile but not two miles, you can sit for an hour but not for extended periods — surveillance showing you carrying a light grocery bag or walking around the block is consistent with your documented condition. It does not contradict anything.
The problem arises when the medical record describes limitations that the surveillance contradicts. If the record says “patient is unable to lift anything” and the surveillance shows you carrying a toddler, the contradiction is damaging. The toddler may weigh 25 pounds; the medical record may have been overstated or imprecise; neither fact helps you at trial. The fix is not to manage your activities to avoid surveillance. The fix is to ensure the medical record reflects your actual condition accurately, so that what the investigator records is consistent with what the doctor documented.
How Schwartzapfel Holbrook advises clients on social media and surveillance
At Schwartzapfel Holbrook, we advise every client on social media and surveillance at the first meeting. We prepare clients to testify about their limitations honestly and specifically — acknowledging what they can do as well as what they cannot. Consistency between the medical record, the testimony, and daily life is the best defense against both surveillance and social media attacks.
Schwartzapfel Holbrook / Fighting For You