42 Facts About Bellingcat

Bellingcat is a Netherlands-based investigative journalism group that specialises in fact-checking and open-source intelligence.

Bellingcat publishes the findings of both professional and citizen journalist investigations into war zones, human rights abuses, and the criminal underworld.

Bellingcat began as an investigation into the use of weapons in the Syrian Civil War.

Bellingcat looked at hundreds of short clips on the Internet, localised them, and examined details of the weapons used.

In other investigations using Google Earth, volunteer investigators working with 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.

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Bellingcat received a €500,000 cash prize from the Nationale Postcode Loterij of The Netherlands; it used these funds to open a new office in The Hague in 2019.

Since 2021, Bellingcat has had a presence in a new Investigative Commons centre in Berlin, Germany.

On 21 December 2016, Bellingcat published a report which analysed cross-border Russian artillery attacks against Ukrainian government troops and in support of pro-Russian separatists in the summer of 2014.

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.

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 said that Bellingcat's report used invalid methods to reach its conclusion.

December 2017 article published by Bellingcat cited a quote from the 2017 British Intelligence and Security Committee report in which a British Secret Intelligence Service source had stated "we know beyond any reasonable doubt that the Russian military supplied and subsequently recovered the missile launcher" which shot down MH17.

In July 2019, Bellingcat released a six part podcast series, produced by Novel, taking an in-depth look at their investigation.

In June 2016, Bellingcat published an article showing that cluster munitions were being used against the New Syrian Army.

Bellingcat provided photographic evidence from first-hand sources that the munitions used were identical to those used by the Russian military.

In February 2017, Bellingcat published an article detailing how rudimentary drones were being used by ISIL to drop explosives onto opposition targets.

In September 2016, Bellingcat released a fact-checking article in response to Russia denying the bombing of hospitals in Syria.

In March 2017, Bellingcat published an investigative report on the bombing of a mosque in Aleppo that killed over 50 civilians.

In 2019 and 2020, Bellingcat published reports on the OPCW findings on the Douma chemical attack, which took place in spring 2018.

In May 2018, in partnership with Forensic Architecture and Venezuelan journalists, Bellingcat collected, timed, and located nearly 70 pieces of evidence related to the El Junquito raid, including videos, photographs, leaked audio of police radio communications and official statements, asking for more material to determine if rebel police officer Oscar Perez and his companions were victims of extrajudicial killings.

Bellingcat published that in the 2018 Hajjah Governorate airstrike by the Saudi Arabian–led coalition the bomb was made by the American company Raytheon.

In November 2018, Bellingcat published the results of an investigation on Houthi broadcasts through their affiliated Almasirah news channel concerning missile attacks targeted against two airports in the United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi International Airport and Dubai International Airport.

Two men had been seen and pinpointed as likely to have carried out the attack; Bellingcat said it had identified one of the suspects as decorated GRU colonel Anatoliy Chepiga.

In June 2019 Bellingcat reported that major-general Denis Sergeyev had travelled to London as "Sergei Fedotov", and appeared to have commanded the operation, making and receiving many telephone calls with a single Russian "ghost phone" without an IMEI.

Bellingcat analysed position data from Sergeyev's phone to trace his movements in London, following its successfully gaining access to travel, passport, and motoring databases for the suspects.

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Report in The Guardian stated that "Bellingcat has frequently sparred with Russian military and diplomatic officials, who have claimed without evidence that Bellingcat fabricates evidence and is a front for foreign intelligence services".

Russian media have said that Bellingcat is funded by the US government to undermine Russia and other NATO adversaries.

Bellingcat assisted the BBC's Africa Eye investigation into the killing of two women and their children by members of the Cameroonian Armed Forces.

On 15 October 2020, a video surfaced of two captured Armenians being executed by Azerbaijani soldiers; Bellingcat analysed the videos and concluded that the footage was real and that both executed were Armenian combatants captured by Azerbaijani forces between 9 and 15 October 2020 and later executed.

In December 2020, Bellingcat published an investigation detailing how the Russian Federal Security Service unit specialised in the use of chemical agents had been tailing opposition leader Alexei Navalny since the moment he announced his plans in 2017 to run in presidential elections, and had agents near his location Tomsk in Siberia when he was poisoned with the military-type Novichok nerve agent in August 2020.

Bellingcat reported on an information operation in Indonesia targeting the West Papuan independence movement with pro-Indonesian government content.

Bellingcat has reported on the attack on the United States Capitol by Trump supporters of 6 January 2021, as well as the fatal shooting of Ashli Babbitt, who took part in the attack.

Bellingcat's website maintains a page that contains eyewitness footage, as well as reports from various information resources.

In 2021, Bellingcat launched an investigation of Maria Adela Kuhlfeldt Rivera, a supposed jewellery designer from Peru.

Bellingcat interviewed various acquaintances of Maria, who told them the cover identity.

Bellingcat's successes have encouraged investment in open-source research capability by much larger and long-established media institutions, human rights organisations, think tanks, and academic institutions.

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

In 2018, Bellingcat was awarded the Golden Nica of Ars Electronica Prize for Digital Communities.

In 2019, Bellingcat received London Press Club Prize for Digital Journalist of the Year.

In 2019, Bellingcat received the Machiavelli Prize from the Machiavelli Foundation in the Netherlands.

In 2020, Bellingcat won Audio and Radio Industry Awards Bronze for Best Factual Series and Silver for Best Independent Podcast for Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 podcast.

Christo Grozev, who served as the primary researcher for Bellingcat, is one of the protagonists in the documentary, and the investigation itself is ? primary storyline in it.