Back in the day, when your dog wandered off, you posted a picture on a telephone pole. If someone broke into your home, you filed a police report and maybe called around to a few pawn shops just in case someone tried to sell what they took from you.
These days, social media is becoming the tool to turn to when you've been victimized.
Karyn Locke's prized possession is a rare Gibson SG guitar, so when it was stolen from her home she pulled out all the stops to make sure it was recovered.
"After we filed a police report I jumped right on the computer, and it was very easy to think of that as the next step to get our guitar back," she said.
She posted a photo of the stolen guitar and a plea for friends to spread the word and find her guitar, hoping someone would see it.
"It's almost like that commercial where they tell two friends and they tell two friends."
It was shared 2,000 times in two days.
"The people that you know who are friends with you on Facebook or followers of you on Twitter, they're more likely to share your own information, so you have an audience that cares about you and they want to see you get help. They want to see you get justice."
Sgt. Eric Gripp says this tactic of sharing video and pictures related to the crime has worked well for law enforcement for years, and now, regular citizens are willing to take matters into their own hands.
"They're not averse to taking a picture of something themselves, taking surveillance footage, a private camera they might have, putting it online themselves and just saying as a catch-all to their neighbors, 'hey, this person broke into my car does anyone recognize them?'"
Lauri Stevens, a social media strategist for law enforcement, says it's human nature to help.
"People want to see bad guys go to jail. They want safe communities. With social media, now it's just so much easier to do that. We can sit with our phone on the couch and actually participate."
Stevens compares this new age crime stopping to an online neighborhood watch. She says social media
posted by the average person is especially helpful in missing persons cases or theft.
"It's good to have these kinds of tools as a citizen to be able to solve some of these crimes ourselves," Stevens said.
Sgt. Gripp cautions people to be careful. He says you don't want to share too much about your crime or your crime online, and when sharing any home surveillance video he warns, "You can't just think 'cause oh, this is just somebody who stole a package off my property, they might not be dangerous."
When soliciting social media help for a crime you need to keep police as involved as possible, especially if someone contacts you saying they have your property.
In Karen's case someone on Facebook reached out saying they had the missing guitar.
"I contacted the police to let them know that somebody did have my guitar and asked the next steps that I needed to take, so I would remain safe," she said.
Police arranged a meeting to return the guitar. She's grateful but knows it's all due to her online crimestopping crew.
"Never underestimate the power of social media," she said.
