Mind the Gap: Sofia Santos OSINT Exercise #029
Welcome everyone to another one of Sofia Santos’ OSINT exercise write-up. This time I will delve into how I solved Exercise #029.
As someone who is new to OSINT this exercise has been a great learning experience for me and has pushed my skills and creativity.
Let us begin!
Task briefing:
I took the photo below whilst riding a train in the UK. I always prefer quiet areas where no one can sit behind me because, in a public space, no information is truly private.Your task is to:
a) Uncover what the person in front of me was reading.
b) Identify the train model.
c) Identify my seat number.Click here to open the image on a new window.
Uncover what the person in front of me was reading.
Since the view of the person’s screen was a reflection, the first thing I did was flip the image. This way the letters would be facing the correct way and make things easier. I also turned up the contrast and increased the sharpness of the image a little to make out the words a bit easier.
I was able to get some loose words just by doing some old fashioned squinting and guessing what the most likely word would be in the context. I was able to make out “leather gloves”, “have seen better days” and “portmanteau”. I was also able to decipher a full phrase: “She has the letters from William’s cousin James, in her…”
My first thought was to look the full phrase in Google Books’ Advanced Search. In the past, this has been a helpful tool in my personal life to look up book and article quotes.
After looking the excerpt up on Google Books, results showed a book by Sara Sheridan, The Fair Botanists. ISBN: 9781529336238, 1529336236
As it can be seen from the underlined text, the words on Sheridan’s book match the ones that were on the person’s screen. Thus, confirming that the person in front of Sofia was reading Sheridan’s book!
a) Uncover what the person in front of me was reading.
The person was reading Sara Sheridan’s book, The Fair Botanists. ISBN: 9781529336238, 1529336236
Identify the train model.
In the task briefing, Sofia said that she was inside a train in the UK. Based on this information I googled “UK train inside”, to see if I could find an inside that matched Sofia’s picture.
The things I was looking for to identify the train model were:
Tray table
Label with QR code
Grey back of seats
Red fabric for seat
Red band on top of seats with red lights
Based on these markers, I was able to find an image on Google that matched most of the traits on Sofia’s picture. I was still missing the QR code on the back of the seat though.
According to the image description this is a LNER new Azuma train.
After googling “Azuma LNER train” I was able to find an image that closely matched the interior of Sofia’s picture, this time with the QR code labels included. This picture was a part of a Twitter post that also contained the outside of the train.
Feel free to drop by and say hello, @_cat_soup on Twitter.
We can see that this train has the number 801 225 on it. After googling “Azuma LNER 801 225”, I found that 801 is a class of Azuma trains.
From LNER’s official documentation (FYI: this link downloads a file) regarding the class of 800/801 trains there are two different models of the 801 class.
According to LNER’s guide, class 801 comes in either 9 or 5 carriages, and the 5 carriage sets will always be doubled up to 10.
In LNER’s seating map we can also see that the 9 coach Azuma trains have a quiet zone. According to this task’s brief, Sofia stated that she prefers to sit in a quiet location. Based on this information, it can be concluded that Sofia was in a 9 coach train.
According to tothetrains.uk, the Azuma class 801/2 is the 9 car model.
b) Identify the train model.
The train model is a LNER Azuma class 801/2 (9 car model).
Identifying the seat number.
This is where I started to overthink! In my pursuit to triple check everything I ended up making things more complicated.
In the task briefing, Sofia said that she likes to sit in the back where no one can look over her shoulder, and also in quiet places. According to LNER’s website, the quieter coaches can be located in either coach H on a 9 coach Azuma or on coach B in their electric trains. Could Sofia have been seated in coach B?
When comparing the seating between the two coaches, it can be seen that there are 4 rows in coach H before the table, and only 3 rows in coach B before the table.
From the picture, it appears that there are 3 rows of seats in front of Sofia and then the table, this suggests that she was in coach H. However, I am unable to see if the last seat in the reflection in the ceiling is facing towards Sofia or away from her.
To fully quell my doubts I made a simulation of the seating position in coach H.
After checking with a mirror to simulate the reflection in the ceiling in Sofia’s picture, it can be concluded that there had to be 4 rows of seats before the table. Otherwise the reflection would not line up correctly. From this, I was able to conclude that Sofia was seated in coach H and not B.
Sofia's seat in coach H
c) Identify my seat number.
Sofia was seated in seat 83 in coach H
With this I conclude my write-up. I hope you all enjoyed this if you’ve made it this far.
This exercise was challenging but also tons of fun, I love being pushed to think outside of the box and try to think of different ways in which I can confirm my findings. However, it has also been a lesson in when to stop overthinking about things and having confidence in your evidence.
Until next time!
