Disinformation is false information deliberately spread to deceive people. It should not be confused with misinformation, which is false information but is not deliberate. "Fake news" has sometimes been categorized as a type of disinformation, but scholars have advised not using these two terms interchangeably or using "fake news" altogether in academic writing since politicians have weaponized it to describe any unfavorable news coverage or information.
The Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, formerly the Main Intelligence Directorate, and still commonly known by its previous abbreviation GRU, is the foreign military intelligence agency of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The GRU controls the military intelligence service and maintains its own special forces units.
Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, such as serious crimes, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years researching and preparing a report. Practitioners sometimes use the terms "watchdog reporting" or "accountability reporting".
Open-source intelligence (OSINT) is the collection and analysis of data gathered from open sources to produce actionable intelligence. OSINT is primarily used in national security, law enforcement, and business intelligence functions and is of value to analysts who use non-sensitive intelligence in answering classified, unclassified, or proprietary intelligence requirements across the previous intelligence disciplines.
Dmitry Lvovich Bykov is a Russian writer, poet, literary critic and journalist. He is also known as biographer of Boris Pasternak, Bulat Okudzhava and Maxim Gorky.
Eliot Ward Higgins, who previously wrote under the pseudonym Brown Moses, is a British citizen journalist and former blogger, known for using open sources and social media for investigations. He is the founder of Bellingcat, an investigative journalism website that specialises in fact-checking and open-source intelligence. He has investigated incidents including the Syrian Civil War, the Russo-Ukrainian War, the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal. He first gained mainstream media attention by identifying weapons in uploaded videos from the Syrian conflict.
MintPress News (MPN) is an American far-left news website founded and edited by Mnar Adley which was launched in January 2012 and also publishes the MintCast podcast. It covers political, economic, foreign affairs and environmental issues. Editorially, MintPress News supports Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and the governments of Russia, Iran, and Syria. It opposes the governments of Israel and Saudi Arabia, and reports geopolitical events from an anti-Western perspective. In one contentious article, MintPress News falsely asserted that the Ghouta chemical attack in Syria was perpetrated by rebel groups rather than by the Syrian government.
Bellingcat is a Netherlands-based investigative journalism group that specialises in fact-checking and open-source intelligence (OSINT). It was founded by British citizen journalist and former blogger Eliot Higgins in July 2014. Bellingcat publishes the findings of both professional and citizen journalist investigations into war zones, human rights abuses, and the criminal underworld. The site's contributors also publish guides to their techniques, as well as case studies.
The propaganda of the Russian Federation promotes views, perceptions or agendas of the government. The media include state-run outlets and online technologies, and may involve using "Soviet-style 'active measures' as an element of modern Russian 'political warfare'". Notably, contemporary Russian propaganda promotes the cult of personality of Vladimir Putin and positive views of Soviet history. Russia has established a number of organizations, such as the Presidential Commission of the Russian Federation to Counter Attempts to Falsify History to the Detriment of Russia's Interests, the Russian web brigades, and others that engage in political propaganda to promote the views of the Russian government.
The Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, also known as the Salisbury Poisonings, was a botched assassination attempt to poison Sergei Skripal, a former Russian military officer and double agent for the British intelligence agencies in the city of Salisbury, England on 4 March 2018. Sergei and his daughter, Yulia Skripal, were poisoned by means of a Novichok nerve agent. Both spent several weeks in hospital in a critical condition, before being discharged. A police officer, Nick Bailey, was also taken into intensive care after attending the incident, and was later discharged.
Unit 29155 is a Russian (GRU) unit tasked with foreign assassinations and other activities aimed at destabilizing European countries. The unit is thought to have operated in secret since at least 2008, though its existence only became publicly known in 2019.
Bellingcat: Truth in a Post-Truth World is a 2018 documentary film that explores the investigative journalism work published of Bellingcat, including the Skripal poisoning and the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
Vanessa Beeley is a British activist and blogger known for sharing conspiracy theories and disinformation about the Syrian civil war and about the Syrian volunteer organisation the White Helmets.
Robert Evans is an American author, journalist, and podcast host who has reported on global conflicts and online extremism. A former editor at the humor website Cracked.com, Evans now writes for the investigative journalism outlet Bellingcat while working on several podcasts, including Behind the Bastards, Behind the Police, Behind the Insurrections, It Could Happen Here, The Women's War, and Worst Year Ever. In 2021 he published his first novel, After The Revolution, in a serialized podcast.
Kloop is a media organization based in Kyrgyzstan known for its news website and journalism investigations. Founded in 2007, Kloop gained prominence in Kyrgyzstan three years later, when it investigated criminal activities of the son of the president of Kyrgyzstan. Today Kloop is one of the most popular news websites in Kyrgyzstan.
The Insider is an independent online newspaper specializing in investigative journalism, fact-checking and political analytics. It was founded in 2013 by Roman Dobrokhotov, a Russian journalist and the owner of the newspaper. The newspaper is known for exposing fake news in Russian media. The editorial office of the website is located in Riga, Latvia. Andris Jansons is the editor-in-chief of the website.
The Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media (SPM) is a controversial group of academics and activists whose stated purpose is to study propaganda and information operations surrounding the Syrian civil war. It was formed by environmental political theory professor Tim Hayward and former academic Piers Robinson in 2017.
Christo Grozev is a Bulgarian investigative journalist and author. He is the lead Russia investigator with Bellingcat, focusing on security threats, extraterritorial clandestine operations, and the weaponization of information. His investigations into the identity of the suspects involved in the 2018 poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal earned him and his team the European Press Prize for Investigative Journalism.
The role of open-source intelligence (OSINT) in response to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine has attracted significant attention.
Manisha Ganguly is an investigations correspondent at The Guardian, specialising in Open Source intelligence. She previously worked as investigative documentary producer for the BBC, where she won multiple awards for her work exposing war crimes. She lives in London, United Kingdom.
