Category: Audio Posts: Selected Articles

When Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton appeared on CNN Friday night, he didn’t hold back when commenting on Trump’s pick for his counterterrorism director.

“Sebastian Gorka is a con man,” Bolton told host Kaitlan Collins.

“He needs a full-field FBI background investigation about his educational claims and things like that,” he added. “I think he is a perfect example of somebody who owes his position purely to Donald Trump, he doesn’t display loyalty, he displays fealty, and that’s what Trump wants.”

Boltson said Trump “doesn’t want Gorka’s opinions.”

“He wants Gorka to say, ‘Yes, sir,’ and I am fully confident that’s exactly what will happen, no matter what it is Trump says,” Bolton argued.

To hear Trump put it, Gorka has been a “tireless advocate for the America First Agenda and the MAGA Movement” since 2015, according to the president-elect’s announcement on Friday.

Gorka, who was born in the UK to Hungarian parents, is “a legal immigrant” with “more than 30 years of National Security experience,” Trump said.

What Trump neglected to mention was that Gorka was pushed out of his White House role as a strategist to the president in his first administration.

Divisive and combative as he staunchly defended Trump, Gorka was one of the main backers of the then-president’s ban on refugees and people from several Muslim-majority countries.

Gorka’s views on Islam have been a source of controversy — specifically, comments he has made about violence being an intrinsic part of the Islamic faith. His academic credentials have also been questioned, as Bolton suggested on CNN.

“Obviously he’s not the expert he claims to be — obviously,” Hungarian newspaper editor Gabor Horvath told NBC News in 2017.

“He got his master’s degree and his PhD from the Corvinus University in Hungary. The Corvinus University is not a center for national security studies, certainly not internationally recognized studies of this kind,” he added.

An op-ed inThe New York Times once referred to him as “The Islamophobic Huckster in the White House.”

Trump’s then-White House chief of staff John Kelly reportedly pulled Gorka’s security clearance when he was on vacation, making it impossible for him to do his job, HuffPost noted at the time.

This time around, Trump has suggested sidestepping the background check process usually conducted by the FBI to get his nominees and appointees into their expected roles.

Gorka has dismissed the threat of white nationalism, and instead argued that Islamist extremists constituted the biggest threat to the US.

His supposed ties to the Nazi-connected Hungarian political group Vitezi Rend have also worried some during his first short stint in the White House. The group collaborated with the Nazis during the Second World War and reformed following the end of the country’s Communist government in 1989, according to HuffPost.

Jewish outlet The Forward reported in March 2017 that Gorka was a member of the group. Gorka wore the group’s insignia at Trump’s first inaugural ball, later saying that the medals he wore belonged to his father, who was handed them as “a declaration for his resistance to [Communist] dictatorship,” Gorka told Breitbart, one of his former employers.

Before coming to the US in 2008, Gorka moved to Hungary in 1992 and worked for the country’s Ministry of Defense before becoming an adviser to Prime Minister Viktor Orban in 1998.

Gorka ran for mayor in the small town of Piliscsaba in 2006, coming in third place. Several members of the community told NBC News that he was a member of Vitezi Rend; one of the group’s leaders told CNN that the organization was never connected to the Nazis and that Gorka was not a pledged member.

Gorka became a US citizen in 2012, which made it possible for him to work for the federal government.

He lasted about eight months in the White House before he was forced to leave. He claimed he resigned, a version of events disputed by the Trump White House.

“Sebastian Gorka did not resign, but I can confirm he no longer works at the White House,” a White House official told several news outlets at the time.

After his departure, Gorka became a political and counterterrorism commentator on right-wing media, with his own radio show and frequent appearances on Fox News and Newsmax.

The 54-year-old pugilist is well-known for his aggressiveness towards the press, often telling reporters to “take a long jump off a short pier,” as Politico noted.

“I wouldn’t have him in any US government,” Bolton told CNN.

“Fortunately, it’s not the highest position he had been mentioned for,” he added. “But I don’t think it’s going to bode well for counterterrorism efforts when the [National Security Council’s] senior director is somebody like that. … But the questions of who are the deputy secretaries, who are the undersecretaries, and so on, is also going to tell us a lot about who’s actually running the government.”

Elon Musk spent more than $100 million to help Donald Trump win the US presidential election. The billionaire will likely earn a lot more from the result – but how?

Last week, during a gathering – undoubtedly a celebration – at Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s so-called Winter White House, someone shouted: “Where is the George Soros of the right?”

Soros, 94, is, of course, the bogeyman for the nationalist movements worldwide because he has long supported progressive and liberal political causes with billions of his own dollars.

So when Musk eagerly raised his hand – he has basically lived in Mar-a-Lago since Trump’s victory in the presidential election – nobody was really surprised. After all, the owner of SpaceX, Tesla, X, and other firms has helped US rightwingers quite a lot.

Musk bought Twitter, renamed it to X, and turned the platform into a right-wing echo chamber – others are allowed in, of course, but just to be constantly harassed and trolled.

Plus, the world’s richest individual then wholeheartedly endorsed Trump’s campaign, spending more than $100 million and saying that the Republican candidate must win because “civilization as we know it is on the line.”

Here’s where the analogy can be ended, though. Whereas Soros only has a net worth of $6.7 billion and has already donated more than $32 billion to his Open Society Foundations, Musk now stands to make much more money than he has given to Trump.

How exactly? In numerous ways, actually. And here’s our attempt to explain how Musk – who will also co-lead a new commission called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) – will become even richer and more influential.

SpaceX the big winner

This week, Trump joined Musk in Texas to watch a successful test launch of SpaceX’s Starship rocket. That wasn’t an accident – SpaceX benefits from billions of dollars in US government contracts (nearly $20 billion since 2008), and is poised to secure more.

Musk’s company is already a major provider of launches to the International Space Station, also surpassing Boeing as NASA’s second most utilized contractor.

Now, SpaceX stands to receive billions more. Precisely Starship is how NASA intends to land astronauts on the moon for the first time in more than half a century. For the first two human landings under the Artemis program, SpaceX has been awarded more than $4 billion.

Besides, Musk simply loves the idea of a new NASA mission to Mars. Since the agency is reportedly considering dropping its own Space Launch System rocket program under the Trump administration and relying more on the private sector, SpaceX would probably be trusted with the task.

Musk recently posted on X: “Vote for @realDonaldTrump if you want humanity to make it to Mars!”

And indeed, Trump – as vain as he’s proven to be – represents the hope for the next big leap for SpaceX. It was Trump who created the US Space Force in 2019 so he could send federal dollars in the direction of Musk’s company after expanding the Space Force’s budget.

Finally, Trump is, of course, anti-regulation, and so is Musk. He’s publicly said that the requirements of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) are slowing Starship’s progress.

The FAA has proposed fines of $633,000 against SpaceX for violating regulations in launches of its Falcon 9 rocket.

Musk criticized the FAA in a series of X posts, saying that the agency is “smothering the national space program” and accused it of “improper, politically-motivated behavior.” However, the FAA’s administrator, Michael Whitaker, has always stressed that SpaceX needs to “operate at the highest level of safety.”

Tesla in the best possible position now

Just so it happens, the “first buddy” is in charge of another company which has regular skirmishes with the regulators – Tesla. To be more specific, the (in)famous electric vehicle company doesn’t really make safe cars, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

In mid-October, right before the presidential election, the agency opened a new investigation into Tesla’s “Full Self-Driving” system after getting a fresh batch of crashes in low-visibility conditions, including one that killed a pedestrian.

Before that, there was a three-year investigation into the company’s less-sophisticated Autopilot system. Regulators found 467 crashes involving Autopilot, resulting in 54 injuries and 14 deaths.

It would seem that the NHTSA doesn’t believe the hype around Tesla’s vehicles such as Cybercabs and Robovans, and is keen to ensure that the company doesn’t lie about their features in public statements. It has also forced Tesla to do recalls it didn’t want.

Naturally, then, any cuts to the agency’s funding or staffing could help Musk’s EV firm. In a sign of what might be in store for the NHTSA, Musk recently said on X: “We finally have a mandate to delete the mountain of choking regulations that do not serve the greater good.”

Auto safety advocates are obviously worried that the DOGE co-chaired by Musk could propose draconian cuts at NHTSA – along the lines of what he did at Twitter after purchasing the platform.

Musk could try to slow or stop NHTSA investigations, and to hell with conflicts of interest or the fact that Tesla actually benefits from government tax incentives.

To be fair, Musk is now saying that the $7,500 federal tax credit for EV buyers should be eliminated. But this would even help Tesla as other automakers would probably cut back their expansion plans for the EV market and thus reinforce Tesla’s dominance.

During a Tesla earnings call in October, Musk also called for a “federal approval process for autonomous vehicles.” This would speed up approval of driverless cars by two or three years, analysts say.

“The future is autonomous electric vehicles. Nonautonomous gasoline vehicles will be like riding a horse and using a foot bone. It’s not that there are no horses. Yes, there are some but they’re unusual. They’re niche,” said Musk.

The market is reacting. Between Trump’s victory on November 5th and the close of trading last Friday, Tesla’s stock price went from $251.50 to $320.72.

According to Tesla’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Musk owns about 715 million shares. It means that the value of his stake has risen by almost $50 billion – that’s more than Musk paid for Twitter in 2022 ($44 billion).

Add to that the possibility that Trump’s administration will impose tariffs on imports from China, and it becomes clear that Tesla might also be protected from cheap – and high-quality – Chinese EVs.

When your middle name is Annoying

Even Dogecoin, the meme-based cryptocurrency, heavily promoted by Musk in recent years, has been benefitting from Trump’s triumph.

Since November 5th, its value has more than doubled – that’s a much bigger jump than what bitcoin has enjoyed. As a trolling exercise, Dogecoin might actually prove to be quite valuable.

X, the home of trolling, though, is bound for even greater success. The platform has lost most of its worth since Musk bought and began playing with it, but with Elon now playing “co-president,” scrutiny from federal regulators, worried about consumer data abuse, might go away.

Musk is on the inside and hard at work promoting his ideas of colonizing Mars and changing life on Earth. But it can be only a matter of time until he’s on the outside looking in.

Plus, major advertisers, having boycotted X over the network allowing weird content to appear next to their products and lifting suspensions of some of the most odious people on the platform, now seem to be slinking back.

A recent report from Adweek said that Comcast, Disney, IBM, and many other companies are returning to X because they obviously see that spending on the platform might be good for business.

For big businesses, it’s important to get in Musk’s good books and, by extension, those of Trump, ruthless logic dictates. Money indeed speaks volumes, especially if you want to stay out of the crosshairs of a certain someone – and who knows, X might still become profitable.

For years, Musk, Trump, and their allies have claimed that social media companies, especially ones owned by Meta, were illegally biased against them in a giant conspiracy. Oh, the irony – that’s all gone now.

“Musk has openly used his platform to boost Trump, attack his opponents, and shape the political narrative. The collusion between government and big tech is no longer a conspiracy theory – it’s out in the open,” Mike Masnick, founder and editor of Techdirt, wrote this week.

So far, it looks like Musk is more engaged with whatever is going on around Trump than most expected. He’s changed his X bio which now says: “The people voted for major government reform.”

But it’s not really fair to call Trump’s victory resounding as some do because not even 50% of voters cast their ballot in support of him on November 5th. Over 151 million Americans voted, but nearly 100 million, even though they were eligible, didn’t bother.

So if Musk thinks his ideas will be almost universally supported, he might be wrong. Besides, even though Trump seems to admire him so far, many of the President-elect’s allies do not – actually, a growing number of them think Elon’s utterly insufferable.

One source told Politico: “Elon is getting a little big for his britches.” Another remarked to NBC: “He’s trying to make President Trump feel indebted to him. And the President is indebted to no one.”

For now, Musk is on the inside and hard at work promoting his ideas of colonizing Mars and changing life on Earth. But it can be only a matter of time until he’s on the outside looking in – and that would definitely be very, very interesting.

US President-elect Donald Trump on Friday (November 23) picked hedge fund billionaire Scott Bessent as his pick for Secretary of the Treasury. If confirmed by the Senate, Bessent would be the first openly gay Treasury secretary.

In a statement posted on social media, Trump said, “Scott is widely respected as one of the World’s foremost International Investors and Geopolitical and Economic Strategists… Scott’s story is that of the American Dream… Together, we will Make America Rich Again, Prosperous Again, Affordable Again, and most importantly, Great Again”.

Former FBI Special Agent Daniel Brunner said if President-elect Trump chooses loyalist and former Trump administration aide Kash Patel to lead the FBI, it would do “massive damage” to the agency.

“Putting someone like Kash Patel in the position of director of the FBI is, I believe, extremely, extremely dangerous because … his resume isn’t traditional,” Brunner said Sunday on CNN.

Brunner later added that Patel “has no experience leading an organization, no less a Cub Scout pack.”

Reports have surfaced that Trump is eyeing Patel for the position and may fire current FBI Director Christopher Wray after the president-elect takes power.

Patel, who was the chief of staff to acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, has defended Trump and testified on behalf of the president-elect against states that were considering taking him off the ballot due to Jan. 6.

Patel works as an adviser to Trump for national security issues and as a board member for Trump’s media company.

In the interview Sunday, Brunner noted that Patel “clearly stated” he wants to seek revenge on those who investigated Trump and his allies.

“He will conduct a massive amount of damage to the interior of the FBI,” he said.

Brunner noted there will be hundreds of employees who are “unjustly fired.” Patel’s potential appointment would mean he’s in charge of “tens of thousands” of employees, including special agents, analysts and “everyone that is enforcing the law” federally.

“So, I think he’ll be very, very dangerous,” Brunner added.

The Hill has reached out to the Trump transition team for comment.

New York, Nov 17 2024-

Counterintelligence expert Kash Patel, who is close to US President-Elect Donald Trump, is reportedly under consideration for appointment to head the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) after having been passed over for the leadership of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

If he gets the job, he will likely be the highest-ranking Indian American in the administration even though it is not a Cabinet post and no names from the community have emerged as of Saturday for the remaining Cabinet-level jobs.

Media reports say that several Trump loyalists are pushing the appointment of Patel, who has called for “drastic measures” to reshape the FBI.

Patel had close ties with Trump who considered him one of his policy specialists, and they both share the view that Trump had won the 2020 election but was unlawfully deprived of the presidency and that there should be retribution for those they consider responsible.

During his campaign, Trump endorsed Patel’s proposals to reshape government in his book, ‘Government of Gangsters’, a title that reflects both their views that a cabal of “Deep State” operatives was running the country behind the scenes.

Patel had served as the Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counterterrorism (CT) at the National Security Council (NSC), before becoming the chief of staff to the then Acting Secretary of Defence Christopher Miller, his final job in the first Trump administration.

His appointment to head the FBI, the powerful domestic intelligence service, is by no means certain as there are others in the running and opposition to him from the more establishment types in the Republican party and government.

Nearing the end of his first term, Trump had sought to appoint Patel as the deputy director of the CIA, but was foiled by opposition from the then-head, Gina Haspel.

The then-Attorney General William Barr also shot down a proposal to appoint him as the Deputy Director of the FBI.

Christopher Wray, who Trump appointed to a ten-year term as the FBI Director in 2017 and who was retained by President Joe Biden, will have to be fired or voluntarily resign for Trump to nominate a new head.

The job required confirmation by the Senate.

Patel started off as a public defender – the government-paid lawyer for poor defendants – and made his jump to the prosecution side as a trial attorney for the Justice Department’s National Security Division which handles terrorism-related cases, and as the liaison to the military’s Joint Special Operations Command.

According to a Defence Department biography, Patel worked with the command “to conduct collaborative global targeting operations against high-value terrorism targets” and oversaw the elimination of Islamic State terror group’s and al-Qaeda’s leaders.

That helped him build his expertise on terrorism and led to his next career move as the national security advisor to the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee.

His work there to unravel the claims of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election on behalf of Trump, and on the FBI’s questionable wiretaps of Trump’s campaign staff drew the attention of the White House and Trump’s allies.

He joined the White House as the Senior Director for Counterterrorism in the National Security Council with also the rank of Deputy Special Assistant to the President.

Trump expanded it, placing Patel among his “top Ukraine policy specialists.”

Politico reported that according to former White House sources Patel had direct access to Trump, to the chagrin of other officials.

He rapidly rose to become a principal deputy to Richard Grenell, the acting director of national intelligence, with his next stop at the Defence Department.

Patel, who uses an abbreviated version of his first name Kashyap, is the son of Gujaratis who came to the US from East Africa, and in his book, he speaks of a deep connection to India.

Patel’s view of the government establishment, like Trump’s, is coloured deeply by distrust and suspicions that it has its own agenda and is loyal to external forces.

He was a firm believer that Trump had won the 2020 election and supported Trump’s calls for retribution.

He said in a podcast interview, “We will go out and find the conspirators not just in government, but in the media” responsible for what he asserted was rigging the election.

About the FBI, he wrote in his book that it “has become so thoroughly compromised that it will remain a threat to the people unless drastic measures are taken.” (Agency)

A Vladimir Putin aide has warned Donald Trump that he is “obliged” to fulfill promises he made during his presidential campaign to bring peace to Ukraine.

The President-elect said repeatedly during his campaign to secure his return to the White House that he would put a stop to the more than two and a half years of war in Ukraine “within 24 hours.”

And Nikolai Patrushev, part of the Russian president’s inner circle and former Secretary of the Security Council, told the Russian newspaper Kommersant that Trump was duty-bound to act on his words.

Patrushev said: “To achieve success in the elections, Donald Trump relied on certain forces to which he has corresponding obligations. And as a responsible person, he will be obliged to fulfill them.

“During the preelection period, he made many statements to attract voters to his side, who ultimately voted against the destructive foreign and domestic policies pursued by the current U.S. presidential administration.

“But the election campaign is over, and in January 2025, it will be time for the specific actions of the elected president. It is known that election promises in the United States can often diverge from subsequent actions.”

Newsweek has contacted Trump’s team for comment.

Patrushev was answering a question about whether the new U.S. administration amounted to “positive changes from Russia’s point of view.”

He went on to say that Putin gave a speech, at the Valdai Forum, an international conference held in Russia, last Thursday, which “sent a kind of greeting to Washington when there is a shift change there.”

Patrushev also said that Putin called Trump “a man” after seeing his response to the assassination attempt on him in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. This “coming from Putin is high praise,” Patrushev added.

But he went on to add that relations between Russia and the Western world could also go in the opposite direction, if the U.S. and the U.K. “consider sabotage on Nord Stream as one of many methods of advancing their economic interests,” for example.

Patrushev said the U.S. and the U.K. were behind the September 2022 attacks on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines, which are still shrouded in mystery—and were planning others.

The U.S. Department of State has denied these accusations, telling Newsweek they are “completely and utterly false.”

A spokesperson also said they would not speculate about how the next administration will deal with the war in Ukraine.

Similarly, the U.K. Foreign Office said it “condemns acts of sabotage on critical national infrastructure and takes the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines seriously.”

A spokesperson added: “It would be wrong to speculate on any policy decisions that the incoming administration of President-elect Trump may make. We have welcomed sustained bipartisan US support for Ukraine, which has been absolutely key in the international effort.”

A Swedish investigation found evidence of sabotage on the pipelines between Russia and Germany. Moscow had initially accused the U.S. but probes by Sweden and Denmark were closed in February 2024 without identifying those responsible, although a German investigation is ongoing.

German authorities had reportedly issued a European arrest warrant in June for a Ukrainian national suspected of sabotaging the pipeline along with two others, using a yacht called Andromeda.

But Patrushev believes that the Ukrainian Navy has “neither the equipment nor the trained specialists to carry out a deep-sea terrorist attack” and said that “only special forces units of NATO countries could carry out sabotage of this scale.”

He said that in the future, new infrastructure, including marine fiber-optic cables that provide connectivity around the world, could come under attack.” The move would have the goal of sowing “chaos” in the global energy market, “including by destabilizing maritime transportation.”

Patrushev is considered one of the key drivers of Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and served as secretary of Russia’s Security Council before being moved to the position of Putin aide. He is also chairman of Russia’s maritime board.

Update 11/13/24, 11:20 a.m. ET: This article was updated to include comment from the U.S. State Department and the U.K. Foreign Office.

Open-source intelligence (OSINT) – the gathering and analysis of publicly available information found on social media, and in databases and government records – can be invaluable in situations when information is sparse, controlled or censored. Journalists today leverage OSINT to expose corruption, investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity, and hold governments and other powerful actors to account.

The investigative journalism group Bellingcat has pioneered the use of OSINT in its cutting-edge reporting over the years. The outlet’s journalists have used OSINT to uncover Russia’s involvement in the 2014 downing of Malaysian Flight MH17 over Ukraine, provide critical evidence of the Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons against civilians, and revealed the massacre of civilians by Cameroonian soldiers in 2020, among other investigations.

“We’ve uncovered and verified lots of potential war crimes, […] spy networks, state-backed assassination teams, the movements and activities of drug cartel leaders, […] and sanctions breaches by the likes of Russia, Iran and many, many more,” said Bellingcat’s lead editor, Eoghan Macguire, during a recent IJNet Crisis Reporting Forum session. 

Macguire outlined how Bellingcat has used OSINT to support its investigations across Africa, and he provided key tools and resources for journalists interested in using OSINT in their own investigative reporting.

Using OSINT to identify war crimes

In his presentation, Macguire detailed how his team investigated alleged war crimes in Ethiopia’s Tigray region during the Tigray war, which lasted from November 2020 until November 2022. During what was a civil war, the Ethiopian government and its allies fought against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. 

Bellingcat reporters began their investigation in March 2021 when graphic videos purportedly depicting the execution of civilians by Ethiopian soldiers surfaced on social media. “Even though these were tough videos to watch, they contained clues that allowed us to verify crucial details,” said Macguire.

Bellingcat investigators analyzed the shadows cast in the footage to deduce the time of day the videos were filmed, and the team used PeakVisor, an app originally designed for mountaineers, to determine the location where the videos were filmed. 

An alternative to Google Maps, which offers only limited detail in rural areas, explained Macguire, PeakVisor provided valuable topographic information that Bellingcat’s journalists could identify in the videos, such as ridges and plateaus. They then compared these features against satellite imagery from Google Earth to identify the location of the massacre: a village known as Mahbere Dego in the Tigray region.  

To identify the perpetrators of the massacre, Bellingcat examined the language spoken in the videos and the uniforms being worn. “Using independent translators, we established that the soldiers were speaking Amharic, indicating they were not from the Tigray region,” Macguire said. This led to the conclusion that they were likely members of the Ethiopian military. 

Ultimately, in collaboration with Newsy and BBC Africa Eye, Bellingcat reported that the executions were carried out by Ethiopian forces. “It was important information to put out,” MacGuire stressed, noting that other major news organizations including CNN later corroborated their results using similar methods.

Tools of the trade

Crucially, many of the tools employed in the investigation, including Google Earth, Natural Earth, and PeakVisor, were free. “You don’t have to be a tech wizard or spend lots of money to conduct open-source investigations,” Macguire noted. “With simple online tools, we were able to do something really powerful.”

In another example, Bellingcat utilized open-source software to track and document the movement of ships to shed light on illicit grain trade originating from the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine. The investigation highlighted how one ship, the Zafar, engaged in ship-to-ship transfers of grain at sea, obscuring the origins of the sanctioned grain, and later integrated the grain into the global market.

Using satellite imagery collected by Planet Labs and ship tracking data from Lloyd’s List Intelligence, Bellingcat reconstructed the journey of the Zafar from Crimea, where it was observed loading grain into silos with its Automatic Identification System (AIS) — a system that is required to be turned on to identify a vessel — turned off. The ship later activated its AIS en route to Yemen, where it transitioned through a U.N. inspection point in Djibouti without being flagged as evading sanctions. 

“Satellite imagery provided a different story from what conventional ship tracking revealed,” said Macguire. The investigation raised critical questions about the efficacy of sanctions and U.N. inspections, and ignited concerns about lack of oversight by U.N. officials of sanction-evading vessels.

The future of OSINT

The potential of open-source data extends beyond journalism; it has implications in legal settings, too, including being used as evidence in international courts. 

As the field matures, however, it faces unique challenges — developments in social media, AI, and disinformation, to name a few. “Social media platforms, once goldmines for information, have become more difficult to navigate,” Macguire observed. He highlighted, in particular, recent changes to platforms like X, which once offered a wealth of information as users regularly posted on the platform, but has seen its use decline after being acquired by Elon Musk.

Emerging technologies like AI, meanwhile, present both opportunities and threats. Although tools developed to analyze large amounts of data — for example, satellite image datasets — can enhance investigative capabilities, AI’s ability to generate deceptive content also poses challenges. “As AI improves, distinguishing between authentic and fabricated images may become increasingly complex,” Macguire warned.

Bellingcat encourages journalists and researchers to collaborate when utilizing OSINT data, sharing their findings and methodologies. As the outlet continues to refine its techniques and adapt to a shifting media landscape, it remains committed to transparency. “The results you can get [from OSINT] can be really, really important,” Macguire said.  

OSINT resources

Macguire offered several tools and resources for journalists interested in OSINT. Here are a few: 

Open-source community

Bellingcat’s Discord allows members to engage, learn and collaborate with fellow OSINT investigators. Beginners and experts alike are welcome.

General OSINT toolkits

Bellingcat’s Online Open Source Investigation Toolkit

BBC Africa Eye Forensics Dashboard

Free satellite imagery

Sentinel Hub EO Browser

Google Earth

Paid satellite imagery (generally of higher quality)

Planet Labs

Maxar Technologies

Free ship tracking data

Global Fishing Watch

Paid ship tracking data

Lloyd’s List Intelligence

Marine Traffic

VesselFinder

Aircraft tracking

ADS-B Exchange

Flight Radar 24

Free open-source tools

Bellingcat GitHub

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Photo by Маk Каmmerer on Unsplash.