Eliot Higgins > Quotes

“The Kremlin employs what disinformation expert Ben Nimmo has dubbed the 4D Approach: Dismiss, Distort, Distract, Dismay.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“What strikes me most is their lack of dissonance: they fail to prove the previous claim, or the one before, yet make the next with equal certainty.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“to manipulative governments, but it would be a mistake to ascribe this all to paid trolls. Sadly,”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: Global Crime, Online Sleuths, and the Bold Future of News

“From an online sleuth’s perspective, the Counterfactual Community badgering can be irksome – but it is useful, too. Naysaying requires us to justify every scrap of evidence, which sharpens our work.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“What we do is far more than just internet research, though. We battle the counterfactual forces warping society. We insist on evidence. And we show ordinary citizens how to expose wrongdoing and demand accountability from the powerful.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“Кремъл използва онова, което експертът по дезинформация Бен Нимо нарича „подхода 4D: Dismiss, Distort, Distract, Dismay (Отричане, Изопачаване, Объркване, Всяване нa страх). Първо, руските високопоставени служители агресивно отричат неудобни факти, вероятно обиждайки самите източници, като ги определят като „русофоби“ или маши нa съперничеща нация. След това е изопачаването - или преувеличаване нa истината до нещо неузнаваемо, като цитиране нa малоброен митинг и характеризиране нa страната като раздирана oт протести, или просто измисляне нa твърдения, както в една статия нa руската държавна новинарска агенция ИТАР-ТАСС в деня нa свалянето нa МН17. Агенцията цитира очевидци, според които сепаратисти са свалили украински „Ан-26“ - нещо, което ние знаем, че никога не се е случвало. Третата тактика, объркване, включва конспиративни теории и смяна нa темата, насочване нa обвиненията към обвинителя, както в „Казвате, че сепаратистите са свалили самолет в Украйна. А какво ще кажете за хилядите цивилни, убити по време нa войната в Ирак?“. Резултатът oт подхода със смяна нa темата е всеобщо морално объркване, че не може да се вярва нa никого и всичко може да е истина.22 Четвъртата тактика е всяване нa страх, заплашваща със сериозни последици онези, които упорстват да опровергават предпочитаната oт Кремъл версия.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: Global Crime, Online Sleuths, and the Bold Future of News

“We have no agenda but we do have a credo: evidence exists and falsehoods exist, and people still care about the difference.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“Pozwalając, by prawda stała się kwestią solidarności grupowej, doprowadziliśmy do katastrofy.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat

“When a Newsweek journalist proposed an article on the OPCW scandal, his editors declined, pointing him to a Bellingcat piece debunking the matter. The reporter, who quit the magazine, then failed to bolster his credibility by telling his tale to that bastion of reliable newsgathering, RT.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“You say that the separatists downed an aircraft in Ukraine, but what about the thousands of civilians killed during the Iraq War?’ The outcome of whataboutism is a worldview of such moral bewilderment that nobody is believable, and anything could be true.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People

“A rhetorical reflex of the Counterfactual Community is endless queries, never pausing to absorb the replies. If I direct them to our exhaustive research, they pivot to the next question. This shell game implies that evidence should be disregarded because political manipulation lurks everywhere – an answer-negating tactic pushed by the likes of RT, whose very slogan is ‘Question More’.”
― Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: An Intelligence Agency for the People