Bellingcat

Bellingcat
Type of site
 Citizen journalism
Available in English, Russian
Created by Eliot Higgins
Website bellingcat.com
Commercial No
Registration None
Current status Active

Bellingcat (also rendered bell¿ngcat) is a website founded by the British citizen journalist Eliot Higgins. Bellingcat publishes the findings of citizen journalist investigations into war zones and the criminal underworld. The site's contributors also publish guides to their techniques, as well as case studies.[1]

Bellingcat began as an investigation of the use of weapons in the Syrian civil war. It first received international attention with its analysis of forged data on satellite images of the downing of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 during the still ongoing war in eastern Ukraine.

Name

The name derives from the idiom "belling the cat", which comes from a medieval fable about mice who discuss how to make a cat harmless. One suggests hooking a bell around his neck, and all the mice support the idea but none is willing to do it.[2]

History

In March 2012, Eliot Higgins started a blog under the pseudonym Brown Moses, through which he published his research into video footage of the Syrian Civil War.[3] He looked at hundreds of these short clips on the Internet, localized them, and examined details of the weapons used. As a result, Higgins was able to demonstrate that the Syrian regime was using cluster munitions and chemical weapons.[4] In 2013, Higgins linked the significant chemical attack in Ghouta (the Ghouta chemical attack) to Bashar al-Assad.[5]

Once Bellingcat was launched, major ground was covered over the course of its first investigation, the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17). Bellingcat concluded that the downing was initiated by the Russian military; this was later confirmed by the Joint Investigation Team (JIT), which found in a report dated 25 May 2018 that the downing of MH17 was initiated by the Russian military.[6] In other notable investigations using Google Earth, analysts from Bellingcat said that they had discovered the coordinates of an Islamic State training camp, as well as the site where an American journalist was killed.[7]

Kristyan Benedict, an Amnesty International campaign manager, told The New Yorker in 2013 that many organisations had analysts but that Higgins was faster than many established investigation teams.[8]

Higgins launched the Bellingcat platform in 2014 with the help of private donations received through the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter.[9] Half of funding comes from grants and donations, the other half from running workshops training people in the art of open-source investigations.[10] For example, Bellingcat has received grants from Google Digital News Initiative, Adessium, and the Open Society Foundations.[11] The organisation publishes guides on how to analyse data and how to create reports, such as "How to Scrape Interactive Geospacial Data" and "How to Identify Burnt Villages by Satellite Imagery".[10]

As of 2018, the company has four full-time staff plus Higgins, 11 members of its investigation team and 60 contributors.[10] The office is in Leicester.[10]

Notable cases

War in eastern Ukraine

On 21 December 2016, a report by Bellingcat was published which analyses the use of Russian artillery in the summer of 2014 against Ukrainian villages.[12]

MH17

Route of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 on July 17, 2014 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur.

On July 17, 2014 Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, a passenger flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was shot down while flying over eastern Ukraine. All 283 passengers and 15 crew members died after the Boeing 777 was hit by a burst of "high-energy objects".[13]

In a press conference, Russian officials blamed the flight's destruction on Ukrainian forces and presented radar data, expert testimony and a satellite image. The radar data that showed another aircraft in the vicinity of MH17 was debunked as falling debris from MH17 by experts. A Spanish air traffic controller in Kiev gave interviews that stated that two Ukrainian fighter jets followed the Malaysian plane but the Spanish Embassy later said that there was no Spanish air traffic controller at either of Kiev's airports. The satellite image showed an aircraft firing on the airliner but Bellingcat exposed the photo as a composite of Google images, with the Malaysian airline logo even being misplaced.[14]

On November 9, 2014, the Bellingcat MH17 Investigation team published a report titled “MH17: Source of the Separatists’ Buk”. Based on evidence from open sources, primarily social media, the report links a Buk missile launcher that was filmed and photographed in eastern Ukraine on July 17 to the downing of the MH17 flight. The 35 page report, including photographs and maps, details the movements of the Buk in eastern Ukraine on July 17, evidence that the Buk originated from the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Rocket Brigade in Kursk, Russia, along with a convoy headed towards the Ukrainian border, and the activity of the vehicles seen in the same convoy after July 17.[15] This report was later echoed by the Dutch-led international Joint Investigation Team. The head of the Netherlands’ National Crime Squad, said they officially concluded that the missile that shot down MH17 "is from the 53rd anti-aircraft missile brigade from Kursk in the Russian Federation".[16]

In June 2015, Bellingcat published evidence that Russia had used Adobe Photoshop to manipulate satellite images of the MH17 disaster. Image forensics expert Jens Kriese of Germany maintained that Bellingcat's report used invalid methods to reach its conclusion.[17] In a follow-up report, Bellingcat published crowdfunded satellite imagery and further analysis that supported their claim.[18]

On December 20, 2017, Bellingcat published an article focusing on a section of the 2017 Intelligence and Security Committee report, which categorically stated that the British stance on the MH17 incident was that Russian forces were behind the orchestration and implementation of a plan to shoot down an aircraft. Whether the target was the MH17 passenger jet is not defined.[19][20]

Syrian Civil War

ISIS (grey) territory change 2014–2016

Beginning in March 2011 after political protests turned violent,[21] the Syrian Civil War has been an ongoing conflict between the Syrian Arab Republic, Syrian Opposition, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and other combatants. Bellingcat reports primarily analyse the factions at war, and what weapons and armor they utilize, as well as news that would normally go unreported by the mainstream media. Bellingcat utilizes a network of contributors who specialize in open source and social media investigation, and creates guides and case studies so others may learn to do the same.[22]

In April 2014, Bellingcat published extensive evidence of chemical weapons being used on Syrian civilians, including children. Collecting and analysing video footage from local sources which apparently showed parts of chlorine cylinders, Higgins said that while the contents of the cylinders could not be verified "the injuries depicted in the videos all appear to be consistent with chemical exposure".[23]

In June 2016, Bellingcat published an article showing the use of cluster munitions were being used against the New Syrian Army, in clear violation of the Convention on Cluster Munitions. Bellingcat provided photographic evidence from firsthand sources that the munitions used were identical to those used by the Russian Military .[24]

In February 2017, Bellingcat published an article detailing how rudimentary drones were being used by ISIS to drop explosives onto opposition targets. Analysing footage from Twitter and other social media platforms, it was discovered that the drones were dropping modified 40mm grenades.[25]

Bellingcat also does extensive reporting into attacks that are not openly claimed by combatants.

In September 2016, Bellingcat released a fact-checking article in response to Russia denying the bombing of hospitals in Syria. The article analysed footage from YouTube and images from Facebook, cross referencing them with areas that were confirmed to be attacked by Russian forces. The article reported that the hospital in question was within the area under Russian attack, although Russia denies these claims.[26]

In March 2017, Bellingcat published an investigative report on the bombing of a mosque in Aleppo that killed over 50 civilians. The article included photographs of the remnants of the bomb used, and showed that the piece was identical to that of similar bombs used by the US military.[27]

Yemeni Civil War

Bellingcat published that in the 2018 Hajjah Governorate airstrike the bomb was made by the American company Raytheon.[28]

Skripal poisoning

Following RT's interview with the suspects of the Sergei Skripal poisoning case, Bellingcat published the suspects’ passport data showing inconsistencies in the official story, and possible links to the Russian secret service. The Russian foreign ministry rejected the report stating that it believed Bellingcat had ties to western intelligence. It noted Bellingcat's access to a Russian database not publicly available.[29][30] Shortly after, the website said it had identified one of the suspects as decorated GRU colonel Anatoliy Chepiga.[31]

Awards

In 2015, Eliot Higgins and Bellingcat received the special prize of the Hanns-Joachim-Friedrichs-Award.[32]

References

  1. ↑ "About - bellingcat".
  2. ↑ "To bell the cat - definition of To bell the cat by The Free Dictionary". Thefreedictionary.com. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
  3. ↑ "Brown Moses Blog: March 2012". Brown-moses.blogspot.de. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
  4. ↑ "Kickstarter-funded journalists found an ISIL training camp using Google Earth and Bing Maps". 24 August 2014. for proving Syria was using chemical weapons from his bedroom in Leicester
  5. ↑ "Watch out for Bellingcat". Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved 2017-03-19.
  6. ↑ "Update in criminal investigation MH17 disaster".
  7. ↑ "Bellingcat: the home of online investigations". Kickstarter. Retrieved 2017-03-19.
  8. ↑ Batuman, Elif (23 November 2013). "Rocket Man". The New Yorker. Retrieved 24 December 2016.
  9. ↑ Beauman, Ned (August 30, 2018). "How to Conduct an Open-Source Investigation, According to the Founder of Bellingcat". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X.
  10. 1 2 3 4 Robin Millard (September 29, 2018). "UK site leads the way in Skripal case with online savvy". AFP. Retrieved September 30, 2018 – via Yahoo! News.
  11. ↑ Eliot, Higgins. "Bellingcat: the home of online investigations". Kickstarter. Retrieved 1 October 2018.
  12. ↑ Sean Case; Klement Anders. "Putin's Undeclared War : Summer 2014 : Russian Artillery Strikes Against Ukraine" (PDF). Bellingcat.com. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
  13. ↑ Jethro Mullen. "Report: MH17 hit by burst of 'high-energy objects'". CNN. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  14. ↑ Maxim Tucker (2015-06-22). "Meet Eliot Higgins, Putin's MH17 Nemesis". Newsweek. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  15. ↑ Bellingcat (November 9, 2014). "Origin of the Seperatists' Buk" (PDF). Bellingcat.
  16. ↑ "Probe: Missile that downed MH17 came from Russia-based unit". The Washington Post. 24 May 2018.
  17. ↑ Jens Kriese (June 4, 2015). "Expert Criticizes Allegations of Russian MH17 Manipulation". Der Spiegel. Retrieved June 11, 2017.
  18. ↑ "Bellingcat kontert Kritik mit neuen Satellitenbildern". Zeit Online (in German). 12 June 2015. Retrieved 11 June 2017.
  19. ↑ Toler, Aric. "British Intelligence Report Confirms Russian Military Origin of MH17 Murder Weapon". Bellingcat. Retrieved 21 December 2017.
  20. ↑ "ISCP Annual Report 2016-2017" (PDF).
  21. ↑ "Middle East unrest: Three killed at protest in Syria". BBC News. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  22. ↑ Higgins, Elliot. "About". Bellingcat. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  23. ↑ "Syria Is Accused of Suffocating Its Citizens with Chlorine Bombs". Vice News. 23 April 2014.
  24. ↑ Komar, Rao. "The al-Tanf Bombing: How Russia Assisted ISIS by Attacking an American Backed FSA Group with Cluster Bombs". Bellingcat. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  25. ↑ Waters, Nick. "Death From Above: The Drone Bombs of the Caliphate". Bellingcat. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  26. ↑ Al-Khatib, Hady. "Fact-Checking Russia's Claim that It Didn't Bomb a 5-Year-Old in Syria". Bellingcat. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  27. ↑ Triebert, Christiaan. "CONFIRMED: US Responsible for 'Aleppo Mosque Bombing'". Bellingcat. Retrieved 2017-03-21.
  28. ↑ "American-Made Bomb Used in Airstrike on Yemen Wedding - bellingcat". 27 April 2018.
  29. ↑ "Skripal Poisoning Suspect's Passport Data Shows Link to Security Services - bellingcat". 14 September 2018.
  30. ↑ Roth, Andrew (15 September 2018). "Documents reveal Salisbury poisoning suspects' Russian defence ministry ties". the Guardian.
  31. ↑ Roth, Andrew; Dodd, Vikram (26 September 2018). "Salisbury poisoning suspect identified as Russian colonel". the Guardian. Retrieved 26 September 2018.
  32. ↑ "Pressemitteilung 2015 - Hanns-Joachim-Friedrichs-Preis". Hanns-joachim-friedrichs.de. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
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