BELLINGCAT ONLINE TOOLKIT VERIFICATION
BELLINGCAT ONLINE TOOLKIT SERIES

'Everybody from rural Cameroon to Syria has a mobile phone camera in their pocket and there are thousands of videos being uploaded everyday, showing serious wrongdoing or even atrocities,' said

BELLINGCAT ONLINE TOOLKIT VERIFICATION

daily quizzes to test yourself about verification techniquesĪre you using open-source tools and investigative techniques for your latest project or story? Let us know will be closely following the in-depth reporting at Africa Eye, which was set up as a result of additional funding giving by the government in 2015, producing programmes that hold power to account.journalist looking at hacking, crime, and technology.social media journalist and trainer at DW News.all source analyst focusing on military stuff.open source analyst and information security.senior fellow at Atlantic Council's DFRLab.senior story producer of NYT Visual Investigations.open source investigator and trainer at Bellingcat.Here is a list of people Leroy has recommended to get started: 'And if you have a passion, get on Twitter and start following the people that use these tools on a daily basis.' 'This is an environment that is moving very fast and there are a lot of new tools and techniques coming out all the time,' Leroy said. These collaborative platforms and resources are a great way to stay on top of what is new, and discuss any issues with other analysts. So, how do you get started yourself with open-source investigations?Īliaume Leroy, open-source investigative journalist at Africa Eye, explained there are a lot of tool databases and kits available online, such as Bellingcat's Online Investigation Toolkit, OSINT Framework and Week in OSINT. 'But it didn't become confusing because we had a very clear structure for the investigation, which went back to basic journalism – we asked ourselves: Where did it happen? When? Who was responsible?' 'We didn't visualise it on a wall chart or anything, most of the work was done on WhatsApp groups, Slack channels and closed Twitter groups,' he said. The change in architecture on the ground and the position of the sun during the video, which was analysed using Suncalc, showed that the crimes took place between 20 March and 5 April 2015.įacebook Graph search tools from the open-source intelligence training guide OSINT helped the team identify the soldiers in the video, who were carrying weapons and wearing uniforms previously seen in Cameroon on an old Channel 4 news report. Satellite imagery also helped them to match landmarks on the ground, confirming the location of the crimes to an area just outside the village Krawa Mafa. oFEYnTLT6z- BBC News Africa September 24, 2018Īfter a tip off, the analysts were able to use tools such as Google Earth and Sentinel Hub to pair the mountain's ridge line in the footage to the topography of Northern Cameroon. #BBCAfricaEye investigated this atrocity. They are blindfolded, forced to the ground, and shot 22 times. In July 2018, a horrifying video began to circulate on social media.Ģ women & 2 young children are led away by a group of soldiers.

'I think by its nature, open-source work is very collaborative, and there is a whole community of open-source analysts out there who have expertise in geolocation, weapons analysis, vehicle tracking and many other areas.'

BELLINGCAT ONLINE TOOLKIT SERIES

'We looked at the video and thought there would be enough information in it to find out at least where it happened,' said Daniel Adamson, series producer of Africa Eye, who explained that his team worked with a group of independent open-source analysts online.

Using a variety of freely available tools, staff at the broadcaster were able to verify that the footage, which showed two women and their children being killed by a group of soldiers, took place in Cameroon – a claim initially stated as 'fake news' by the Cameroonian government. The BBC's new investigative unit, Africa Eye, published a detailed breakdown of its latest project last week, showing how open-source investigators verified a video from sub-Saharan Africa that had gone viral on social media.

Bellingcat online toolkit