Exposing the Invisible

The digital age is enabling collaboration between activists, hackers and journalists on an unprecedented scale. It is also encouraging citizens to learn the tools of investigation so that they can better understand the world around them. This has led to previously unimaginable possibilities in investigative reporting. People are newly empowered to uncover hidden information, expose corruption and bring the truth to light.

Through a series of short films, video interviews, guides and resources, Exposing the Invisible looks at different techniques, tools and methods along with the individual practices of those working at the new frontiers of investigation. This content is regularly developed alongside researchers, activists, journalists, developers and artists who are working in the field of investigation.

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More from this project

Investigation is Collaboration: How to Make It Work

Never investigate alone. Collaboration is essential to your safety, well-being and effectiveness as an investigator, no matter the context. This guide from Exposing the Invisible: The Kit will help you plan, organise and run your collaboration with investigators, sources and others.

Data Acquisition for Beginners

Finding and gathering information is essential to any investigation, but not all data sets are created equal. This new chapter of Exposing the Invisible: The Kit includes descriptions of common file types, methods for gathering data, and a how-to guide on converting your data into a format more easily analysed by computer programs.

Evaluating Evidence and Information Sources

You’ve identified and collected information that may serve as evidence in your investigation. What next? Learn how to analyse and verify it as well as how to evaluate your information sources in this new chapter from Exposing the Invisible: The Kit.

Investigative Institute: Deadline Extended

The deadline for applications to our 'Exposing the Invisible' Investigative Institute from January-February 2021 has been extended to 11th December. Join us for a three-week online workshop to share skills and techniques for secure investigations and digital research methods across the European Union.

Gathering Visual Evidence

Learn how to identify, record and represent the images of an event by mastering the basics of visual evidence collection in this new chapter from Exposing the Invisible: The Kit.

Safety First!

Stay digitally, physically and psychologically safe and aware of potential risks by adopting some basic good practices and tools to keep your human sources, yourself and your evidence protected in this new chapter of Exposing the Invisible: The Kit.

What’s in a Company?

From Exposing the Invisible - The Kit: Get started with basic know-how about researching companies by understanding essential concepts and practices used in the ‘corporate world’, accessing useful resources to help you map business ownership and connections, and seeing how others investigate obscure business activities around the world.

Ad.Watch - Investigating Political Ads on Facebook

From Exposing the Invisible - The Kit: Two investigators trace their process of creating the project ad.watch, an open-research-style investigation into political advertising on Facebook. This case study follows the project’s evolution from a limited endeavour to a growing resource that facilitates investigations on political ads around the world.

Digital Resources for Citizen Investigators

Many of us currently live and work in physical isolation, but we are constantly bombarded with digital information. Some of it is biased, some of it is fake, and some of it can cause unnecessary panic. Now is the perfect moment to polish your evidence collection and verification skills - so we've compiled a package of recommended resources for investigation-hungry citizens.

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Signs, Symbols and Other Visual Clues

From Exposing the Invisible The Kit: How to investigate or aid your investigation by exploring visual signs or symbols, especially in cases where very little direct information is visible, available or accessible.

How to Manage Your Sources

From Exposing the Invisible The Kit: Start building your own contacts, learn how to develop, interact with and maintain sources and how to enrich your investigations with their cooperation.

Exposing the Invisible: The Kit

The Kit is a self-learning toolkit for investigation techniques. It's the starting point for curious minded people who want to start uncovering the evidence and information around them.

Retrieving and Archiving Information from Websites

In this chapter from Exposing the Invisible - The Kit, Wael Eskandar and Brad Murray explain ways to find and retrieve historical and ‘lost’ information from websites, to serve as evidence that something existed online, and ways to archive and preserve your own copies of webpages for future reference.

Related content

Exposing Internet Scam Operations

In the past several years, internet-enabled scams have become more insidious. As technology advances and skills and resources are becoming more readily available, scammers are able to create more believable and difficult to detect websites, emails, social media profiles, and other tools to help them carry out their schemes. In this article, we will expose internet scam operations by exploring types of scams that you are likely to come across which will hopefully build your resiliency.

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The Glass Room: Capsule 1.0

The Glass Room presents Capsule 1.0, a quarterly showcase of digital objects - old and new - from previous Community Edition series, independent investigations and collaborations. This first capsule explores how our phone numbers, face prints and personal data travel from our smartphones to different third-party organisations.