A little late after being hungover from both food or alcohol for the last week and a half, we decided to make a list of our favorite investigations from the past year. All of the investigations below affected us or taught us a great deal. There are no doubt a few missing from this list […]
Russia Theft Watch: when corporate interests hijack the open-source investigative space
This post was written in August 2022. On the 26 July 2022, the Russian Theft Report dropped, claiming to ‘expose’ Russia’s looting of Ukrainian assets “like steel and grain” using “open-source intelligence tools”. The report was the work of the Initiative for the Study of Russian Piracy (ISRP) a self-described group of “former U.S. government […]
Infographic: Who is transporting Russian oil and gas?
After weeks of wrangling, European leaders last week reached agreement to ban 75% of Russian oil shipments into the EU. The sanctions target all seaborne oil shipments from Russia to European ports. Lots has been written about where Russian oil and gas is going, but I thought it might be interesting to take a look […]
How we used a Twitter bot to identify the companies shipping Russian oil to Europe
In this article, we explain how we were able to identify the companies behind the transport of Russian oil to European markets. Our aim was to identify the shipping companies facilitating the trade of Russian oil and gas and shed a light on the often opaque supply chains run by shipping companies.
Leonardo da Vinci would have been great at OSINT
Up until the beginning of the 16th Century, most maps of cities were drawn from a hillside view, also called a side-on or birds-eye perspective. They often lacked accuracy as buildings in the forefront would appear larger than equally sized buildings in the the distance. The surrounding landscape and prominent features were often exaggerated. Many […]
How to track Russian oil
On March 9th 2022, Greenpeace launched a Twitter bot called @RUTankerTracker. The bot tweets out every time a ship leaves a Russian port with oil or gas. Thanks to the bot, Greenpeace was able to confirm that 148 super tankers had left Russia since the start of the war. The shipping industry is deceptive and […]
Radar, the ‘new’ satellite imagery
Since Russia began the invasion of Ukraine last week, the Twitter OSINT community, open-source investigators, and analysts, have been in full gear and many working around the clock. Volunteers and professionals (often both simultaneously) are verifying bits of information, tracking casualties and lost equipment, and geolocation airstrikes. I have participated in this Twitterverse myself but […]
When do you stop verifying?
An important part of any investigation is verifying pieces of evidence that you or your team have managed to collect, be it images, videos, or statements made by witnesses or court documents. In most cases, easier said than done. There are a number of variables that determine the difficulty of verifying, say an image. The […]
Ocelli Project: the power of transparent methodologies
The Ocelli Project started as a response to the prosecution of the Rohingya people in Myanmar. In December 2021, Ocelli Project published their findings documenting 38,000 buildings that had been destroyed whereas 24,000 of these had clear burn marks. They did most, if not all of this, remotely and volunteer-run. It is one of the […]
Feminism, power relations, and OSINT
Perhaps from a reductionist perspective, citizen investigations would not be considered anything new. It is a cocktail of tools, methodologies, and disciplines, that have existed for some time and that are used by the investigative journalist, the academic criminologist or the activist artist. Yet, when viewed holistically, citizen investigations are ground-breaking, radical, and perhaps, just […]
Maps & the Open Source
Maps are, perhaps, the most common and important tool for any open source investigator. The reason for this is the versatility, simplicity, and effectiveness of using maps for gathering and visualizing information/evidence. For myself (Robin), it was also my introduction to OSINT with the Tibet Research Project and one of my first ever OSINT guides […]
Understanding Bias in Open Source Investigation
Bias in research, journalism, investigation, means several things. However, more often than not, when investigating using open source techniques we are often subjected to specific types of bias. Investigators are often using specific tools, methods, and language, that help form our investigations and the type of information and/or evidence we interact with. Generally, we can […]
Getting Started in Open Source Research
If you are new to the world of OSINT (OOSI, OSI, etc.) and are looking to get started, this is the guide for you. Published by Bellingcat, this comprehensive guide will help you get started and get a feel for what it means to do open source research. It also includes a many additional resources […]
OCCRP’s Aleph
When trying to find documents relevant to your investigation, it can be crucial to know where to look. One of the places to look for information is Aleph. Run by Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), Aleph is one the most useful databases to look public records, leaks, you name it. Take a look […]
Verification Handbook
Verification is one of the single most important steps in an investigation. There will be other useful sources for verification added here, but a useful one to start off with is the Verification Handbook. Free online, this handbook provides you with the very basics of verification. Recommended to anyone just getting started or in a […]
