What this firm is
What does OUROBOROS Consulting actually do?
Four things, and they are less related than the word “consulting” makes them sound.
I help people navigate institutions that are not built to be navigated. I teach research and digital self-defense as skills you keep. I build technology and AI systems for people and small organizations. And I design brands and websites.
The first two exist because I have been through institutional processes without help and know what that costs. The second two are how I make a living, and they fund the first two.
How do the four services differ?
The clearest way to tell them apart is by who does the work.
| Service | Who does the work | Typical rate |
|---|---|---|
| Advocacy & Institutional Navigation | We do it together, on your own records | $50/hr sliding, $125 to $225 for records and chronology work |
| Research Literacy & Digital Self-Defense | You do it, I teach you how | $50/hr sliding, $95/hr individual, $1,200 half-day workshop |
| Technology & AI | I build it and hand you the keys | $150 to $375/hr |
| Brand & Digital Studio | I build it and hand you the keys | $100 to $200/hr |
If you are not sure which one you need, book the free consultation and I will tell you. Sometimes the answer is that you need none of them, and I will say that too.
The line between teaching and doing
Will you look someone up for me?
No.
Not for a fee, not as a favor, not as a demonstration in a training session. There is no version of the question where the answer changes.
Why not?
Two reasons. The first one is not a choice I made.
Minnesota licenses this work and I am not licensed. Minn. Stat. §326.338 subd. 1 defines the business of a private detective as undertaking certain acts, for a fee, “for the purpose of obtaining information for others.” Investigating a person’s identity, conduct, movements, whereabouts, or reputation is on that list. There is no exception for public records, and no exception for open-source methods. §326.3381 subd. 1 makes it an offense not only to do that work without a license but to advertise that I am available to do it. §326.339 makes a violation a gross misdemeanor.
The licensing path is not realistically open to me either. §326.3382 requires 6,000 hours of investigative work attested under oath by a present or previous employer. I have never been employed as an investigator. There is nobody who could sign that.
The second reason is the one I would hold anyway. The same techniques that let a journalist verify a source let an abuser find someone who moved. I cannot reliably tell those two people apart from an inquiry form, and the cost of being wrong is not mine to pay. So I do not take the work, and I do not have to spend my judgment on who is lying to me.
Where exactly is the line during a session?
These are my rules, and they hold in every session regardless of who is asking or what they are paying.
- I never type a real person’s name into a search for you. Not even to show you how it works.
- We practice on me, on you, or on a public figure with no connection to anyone in the room. Usually me. I am the safest target available.
- Your hands stay on your keyboard. I teach, point, and explain. I do not drive.
- I do not produce a document about a person. No profile, no dossier, no summary, no timeline about someone else.
- Nothing I teach is packaged as evidence. Not for a hearing, not for a board, not for a trial.
Rule 1 is the one that makes teaching harder, because demonstrating on a real target is the natural way to teach this. It is also the rule that matters most, so it does not move.
My records are about what someone did to me. Is organizing them “work aimed at a third party”?
No, and this is worth being precise about.
If you already hold the material, organizing it is not investigation. Your medical file, your correspondence, your HR record, the messages on your own phone: those are yours. Putting them in date order and naming the pattern inside them is documentation work, and I do it.
What I will not do is go looking for anything new about the other person. And I will not frame the result as evidence for a proceeding. What you get back is your own record, organized, with my notes. What you do with it after that is yours to decide.
What do you actually teach, then?
How to find public records and understand what they mean. How to read a document critically and tell a primary source from a repackaged one. What the open internet already exposes about you, and how to shrink it. How to document an ongoing situation so the record holds up later. How to use Claude and the Apple ecosystem deliberately instead of by accident.
Most people want three to five sessions, not a standing engagement. That is by design. If you still need me in a year, I taught it badly.
Can I use what you teach me to look someone up?
I cannot control what you do after you leave, and I am not going to pretend otherwise.
What I do is screen before we start. I ask what you are trying to accomplish, and I decline what I cannot establish. That screen is not perfect. It is what I have.
Two things worth knowing. If you use these skills to research people for others, for a fee, the same statute that applies to me applies to you, and it is your exposure. And if it becomes clear mid-engagement that the purpose is not what you told me, I stop, and I say why.
What I turn down
What kinds of requests do you decline?
The recurring ones, in the order I get them:
- Locating a person who does not want to be found
- Monitoring or checking up on a partner, an ex, or an adult child
- Running a background check on a date, a tenant, a neighbor, or a coworker
- Verifying whether someone is telling the truth about their past
- Anything described as needing to be ready for court, a board, or an investigator
- Access to an account, device, or file that is not yours
Some of those are illegal for me. Some are legal and I still will not do them. I do not sort them for you on the way in. The answer is the same.
I am being stalked or harassed. Can you help me find out who it is?
I cannot find them for you. I want to be direct about that before anything else, because you have probably already been passed around, and another soft maybe is not what you need.
Here is what I can do.
Shrink what they can see. Most harassment runs on information that is publicly available about you right now. Data brokers, old accounts, public records, metadata in your own photos. Reducing that is the direction of my work I can do fully and legally, and it is often the intervention that actually changes the situation.
Harden your devices and accounts. Apple’s security tools are strong and almost nobody has them configured correctly. The security audit and Advanced Data Protection walkthroughs are free and you do not need me to use them.
Teach you to document it. A record built correctly from the start is worth more than one assembled in a panic later. Start with documenting interactions and the safety plan guide.
Who can actually identify them. Law enforcement, through a report. A licensed private investigator, which in practice usually means one working through an attorney. A domestic violence advocate in your county, who can also help with an order for protection and who costs nothing.
If you are in danger right now, contact emergency services. The survival guide lists resources that can help.
Money
What does it cost, and will you turn me away if I cannot pay?
My floor is $50 an hour. That is what survivors, seniors, and veterans pay for advocacy sessions, record review, and training. There is no means test and no paperwork. You ask, that is the rate.
I used to say no one would be turned away for inability to pay, and that language implied a $0 option that does not exist. It is gone now. I am telling you where it went because a firm that quietly edits a broken promise is doing the thing this firm exists to oppose.
Here is the honest version. I have rent and groceries like anyone else, and this is my only income. $50 an hour is what keeps the practice open. I would rather give you a real number up front than let you disclose your finances to me and then discover I cannot meet you there. That disclosure costs you something, and you should not have to spend it to find out the answer.
Do you do free work?
The first conversation is free. Forty-five minutes for advocacy, thirty for training. No commitment, and no referral required.
Everything on this site is free and always will be: the tutorials, the survival guide, the PSAs, the glossary. That is deliberate. Most people who need this do not need to hire me, they need the information, and gatekeeping it would be indefensible.
Beyond that, my pro bono capacity is small and it fluctuates. If $50 is genuinely out of reach, say so on the intro call. I will tell you honestly what I can do rather than let you hope.
Why do commercial rates cost three times more?
Because they subsidize the rest.
A half-day workshop for an organization funds a month of sliding-scale sessions. That is the whole structure. Nobody paying a commercial rate is being overcharged, and nobody paying $50 is receiving charity. It is one practice with two prices, and the higher one is what makes the lower one possible.
Limits and privacy
Are you a lawyer? A therapist? A licensed investigator?
None of the three.
I am not an attorney and I do not give legal advice, ever, including the kind that sounds like general information. I am not a clinician and nothing here is treatment or diagnosis. I am not a licensed private detective, for the reasons above.
Each of those is a real boundary with a reason behind it. All three are covered in more detail on the disclaimer page.
Is what I tell you confidential?
What you send me stays between us. I do not sell it, share it, or hand it to anyone.
The honest limits, so you can decide with the full picture:
I hold no legal privilege. Attorney-client privilege and therapist confidentiality are legal protections that attach to licensed professionals. I am neither, so what you tell me is not privileged, and a court could in principle compel it. I have never been asked. You should still know before you tell me anything.
The form goes through a third party. The intake form is processed by Formspree, which forwards it to my email. Only what you type is collected. Nothing is gathered silently.
The site itself does not watch you. No analytics, no cookies, no trackers, no third-party requests at all. You do not have to believe me. Open your browser’s network tab and reload any page. The privacy page explains what you will see.
If you would rather not put something in a form, say so in the first message and we will find another way.
How do I start?
Book the free consultation. Tell me roughly what is going on. If I am the wrong person, I will say so on that call rather than take your money to find out slowly.