She posted about Charlie Kirk's death. Within eight hours, she was fired

Xinyue Chen for NPR

Scrolling through social media during a work break, Alexandra realized she was going to lose her new job.

An X account with over 500,000 followers had reposted a screenshot of a Facebook post she'd made about slain conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

"You log onto Twitter and you see half a million people following a page, including Elon Musk. They're saying, you better fire this person," said Alexandra. "I knew that they were going to fire me because of the pressure by the mob."

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The X account also named Alexandra and her employer. NPR is not naming the X account and also only using Alexandra's middle name because she is concerned about her safety.

Less than three hours after the X post about her, Alexandra's employer fired her via email. There was no conversation, Alexandra said. She had started the cybersecurity job just two weeks before.

toggle caption Keren Carrión/NPR

And then there were the threats. One user on Facebook asked Alexandra how she liked an Italian restaurant across the street from where she lives in New York City, a sign that someone had tracked down her address and possibly other personal information.

"4.5 out of 5 stars, sounds pretty decent," the post said.

Alexandra left her apartment. "If they can come for me on the Internet, they can definitely come for me in real life."

She first went to a friend's place across town. "I woke up in her kid's princess room in the morning, and then I went to another friend's house in Connecticut for the next three or four days."

Alexandra is among the people who lost their jobs because of their social media posts about Kirk's death. She is not the only one who has expressed concerns about physical safety after naming-and-shaming campaigns online. While such campaigns are not new, both Alexandra and researchers watching them noted how the scrutiny is now sharply focused o