Stage Talks with Bellingcat

This week's stage talk is about using open sources in environmental focused investigations. We spoke to freelance journalist Luiz Toledo about his recent work covering deforestation policy gaps. He uncovered his stories using open databases and FOIA requests. Note that Luiz's mic has some distortion in the recording. The talk was hosted by Charlotte Maher on Thursday August 29th 2024. Music featur...

In this week's stage talk we discuss open source research methods of covering protest movements and any corresponding violent action. Using the example of recent clashes in Bangladesh, our team unpack how they go about reporting on this topic, sharing their favourite resources, techniques and advice. The talk was hosted by Charlotte Maher on Thursday August 15 2024. Music featured is courtesy of A...

This week we were joined on stage by Sam Stecklow, from the not-for-profit newsroom The Invisible Institute . Within the talk we discussed their work on making police complaint data publicly accessible and explored their collaborative models, funding and large data projects. The talk was hosted by Giancarlo Fiorella on Thursday August 1 2024. Music featured is courtesy of Artlist. Join our Discord...

This week we were joined on stage by Aram Shabanian, the Open-Source Information Gathering Manager at the New Lines Institute and long time Bellingcat contributor. Aram shared a long list of interesting open source tools that citizens and journalists alike can use to help monitor wildfires. Find the full list of tools shared by Aram here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1SJHzw5cSenCvEq7iGEy...

This Stage Talk is about the impact of conflict on cultural heritage sites and how, as open source researchers, we can monitor the scale of destruction. The discussion was based around our latest documentary with Scripps News, which you can watch in full here Tools : Planet Sentinel Hub Google Earth Ollie Ballinger's damage probability map tool of Gaza Wikimapia Annique's analysing satellite image...

In this Stage Talk we discuss extremism on digital gaming platforms with experts Rachel Kowert and Linda Schlegel. We talk about how and why extremists are using digital gaming spaces for radicalisation and mobilisation efforts, but also about prevention efforts to stop extremists from exploiting these gaming communities. You can find Linda and Rachel's book here: www.routledge.com/Gaming-and-Extr...

In this week's Stage Talk we were joined by Centre For Information Resilience's Sofia Santos. Sofia also runs a website called Gralhix.com which provides exercises and guides for those needing to practice their open source research skillsets. The discussion on stage was all about how to get into our industry, Sofia provided invaluable tips and resources for beginners. The links we shared during th...

In this week's Stage Talk we were joined by Bellingcat' Research Lead, Carlos Gonzales. Carlos unpacked a series of recent investigations, delivered by Bellingcat and partners into human smuggler operations across South America and into the US. You can find a link to Bellingcat's investigation into the digital coyote here: https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2024/04/30/a-phantoms-tale-the-coyote-influ...

In this week's episode, co-founder and director of The Continent, Sipho Kings joined us. The Continent is an award winning journal, distributed weekly to audiences, covering 54 countries. It's published as an old fashioned newspaper of sorts, on a beautifully designed PDF, and distributed via word of mouth, on closed messaging platforms. In the talk we spoke about the benefits and limitations of d...

This week we spoke to a representative from Bellingcat's Justice and Accountability Unit, Consultant Natasha Pereverzina. Bellingcat’s Justice and Accountability Unit is a joint project with the Global Legal Action Network. Through years of collaboration, we have developed and tested a step-by-step methodology for investigators to follow, hopefully ensuring the viability of open source information...

This week's live Stage Talk was slightly different, we were joined by a Discord community member/open source researcher, Allison Jenkins. Allison was speaking on an ongoing project that she was looking for support on. Allison has lived experience of the Troubled Teen Industry and realised there was a lack of comprehensive and easy to access information on the industry for concerned parents or for...

In this week's live Stage Talk we were joined by Sasha Issenberg, an author and political writer, speaking on how political parties around the world but particularly in the US, have previously and are currently responding to election mis and disinformation. You can find Sasha's full list of books here: https://www.sashaissenberg.com/copy-of-sasha-s-other-writings And he can be found on X here: htt...

In this week's Stage Talk we were joined by fact checkers, Alice Milliken and Hannah Ajakaiye. In the talk we discussed the role of a fact checker in this digital age and how these skillsets are vital for journalists, researchers and the wider public. We also spoke about how AI has had an impact on verification techniques. Hannah's profile A link to one of the social videos produced with Hannah fo...

In this week's Stage Talk we were joined by Bellingcat reseracher, Logan Williams and some Discord community members who have recently become Bellingcat contributors. They were there to speak on a series of investigations into an environmental disaster which had been evolving since February 7th in Trinidad and Tobago. Bellingcat and these discord members used open sources to reveal details about t...

In this week's Stage Talk we were joined by Bellingcat' Director of Research and Training, Giancarlo Fiorella. Giancarlo detailed Bellingcat's efforts in the education space and how training high school students in media literacy may be one solution to the issue of disinformation. You can find a link to the Student View project here: https://thestudentview.org/resources-hub/ And our available work...

Warning: This episode discusses explicit adult content and child sexual abuse material (CSAM). This week we were joined by Bellingcat Researcher Kolina Koltai, discussing her latest research focus into nonconsensual sexual AI generated imagery and the communities and companies set up to create and distribute AI porn. Her research so far has led to restrictions on one company's payment providers an...

For the first stage talk of 2024 we were joined by Bellingcat Technical Fellow George Dyer. George is a developer and an entrepreneur, he is the cofounder of Informatism, an AI and data research firm that is currently building a financial news and data platform. During his time at Bellingcat George built a useful toolkit for financial researchers and journalists. The toolkit allows users to naviga...

For our final Stage Talk of 2023, Ollie Ballinger joined us on stage. Ollie is a lecturer in Geocomputing at University College London and a regular Bellingcat contributor. He is known for his development of useful tools for open-source research. In this session, he shares the details behind his latest tool, a map that allows you to estimate probable damage in a given area based upon Sentinel-1 sa...

This week journalist and mental health first aider Hannah Storm joined us on stage. Hannah co-authored the first study into moral injury and the media for the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. She also launched the Headlines Network, an organisation set up to create connections and drive conversations towards improving mental health in the media and communications industries. During t...

This week new Bellingcat researcher Pooja Chaudhuri joined us on stage. Pooja is experienced in following the movements of far-right groups in India. For her first article for Bellingcat, Pooja investigated the phenomena of auto-generated music videos on YouTube and how some of these lyric videos were based upon songs that encourage the expulsion of muslims from India. During the talk she unpacks...

This week Bellingcat researchers Annique Mossou and Foeke Postma joined the Bellingcat Stage Talk stage. Both researchers have a passion for unravelling historical secrets and have recently published articles relating to old mysteries. During the talk they discussed these pieces of research (linked in this description), expressed their reasoning as to why investigating old photographs should be se...

This week we spoke to Christopher Miller from the Financial Times. Chris wrote a book titled "The War Came To Us: Life and Death In Ukraine' , the book is the Bellingcat' Discord Book Club's Book of the Month for September. During the talk Chris answered the audience's questions on life and war in Ukraine and his own experiences of reporting. You can find how to purchase the book via this link: ht...

Listen in as Bellingcat tech fellow Sophie Tedling breaks down how to use a tool, built for mountaineers, for geolocations and other open-source research purposes. She also shares her personal experience as an open-source researcher with Bellingcat's Global Authentication Project. If you have a suggestion for the developers of PeakVisor after listening to this episode you can reach out to them at...

This week's Stage Talk is with Aram Shabanian. Aram works at the Newlines Institute for Strategic and Policy as the Open-Source Information Gathering Manager for the Strategy and Innovation Department. In the talk he shares details on how to monitor traffic cameras, news channels and live webcams using free to access tools. This is an audio recording of a live video presentation. The tools discuss...

We speak to Bellingcat researcher Youri van der weide about his latest article looking into incidents from the IDF raid of Jenin, West Bank produced alongside Bellingcat discord members. Youri discusses how the discord community members got involved in the research and how Bellingcat hope to work with our wider community in the future. The talk was hosted in the Bellingcat discord server on Thursd...