Brecht Castel Profile picture
Jul 1, 2022 β€’ 18 tweets β€’ 9 min read β€’ Read on X
This photo collage got 22K likes on #Instagram: it shows a swimming pool 🏊 in #Kharkiv πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ before and after Russian shelling πŸ‡·πŸ‡Ί.

"Is this supposed to be the same place before and after?" πŸ€”

Let's find oud! πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡ 1/...

#OSINT πŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸ“Έ
#GeoLocation 🌍
#HowToOSINT 🧐
We upload the image in Yandex. That search engine suggests that we are indeed seeing a swimming pool in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv πŸŸ₯.

Kharkiv is the second largest city in Ukraine, close to the Russian border and has been under attack since the beginning of the war. 2/...
On a Ukrainian website with info about swimming pools in Kharkiv, we found the same photo. βœ…

We also find an address: Alchevskyh Street 50 A. We search for that address on Google Maps and indeed we end up at the sports complex of the Polytechnic Institute. πŸ—ΊοΈ 3/...
On Maps we can find several pictures of the inside of the complex (left).

We can see a swimming pool πŸŠβ€β™€οΈ and a multipurpose hall πŸ€πŸ€Ό.

It seems to be the same swimming pool as in our collage (right) and the roof structure of the multipurpose hall also seems to match. πŸ€”4/...
We are looking for more footage of recent damage to sports infrastructure in Kharkiv. πŸ”Ž

That's how we ended up with this short clip on #YouTube: 5/...
We compare the bottom photo of the collage (left) with the video (right).

Visual elements match πŸŸ₯🟦🟨: we see the same place. βœ… 6/...
We also found a news report on Facebook, uploaded on 24 June.

Again, we compare this video (right) with the picture of the multipurpose hall we found on Google Maps (left).

Five πŸ€ rings πŸŸ₯, the roof structure 🟩 and the wood-coloured wall 🟨 match. ➑️ Same place. 7/...
πŸ‘†We can conclude that the sports complex of the Polytechnic Institute in Kharkiv was indeed damaged recently, moste likely by Russian missile attacks.

Is the swimming pool located on the same site? πŸ‘‡8/...
We compare Google Streeview at the sports complex (right) with the swimming pool from the photo collage (left): the window structures match. βœ… 9/...
A few dozen metres further down the street on Google Streetview (right) we recognise the damaged building from the TV report on Facebook (left).

(Over and over, compare visual clues from multiple sources to understand the situation. πŸ’―) 10/...
From the πŸ‘† info and the visible architecture in both photos, we can deduce that these are two adjacent sports halls in the same complex.

We can see this clearly on an aerial photo on Google Maps (right). The damaged sports hall 🟧 is located next to the πŸŠβ€β™€οΈ pool 🟦. 11/...
On 26 June, the governor of the #Kharkiv region published photos of the rocket impact on the sports complex on Telegram.

There is also one photo of the damage to the swimming pool 🟦.

We can see that there is damage, but the roof has not collapsed. 12/...
The local Kharkiv Times newspaper published an article on 24 June entitled 'Last night, Russian invaders almost destroyed the HPI sports complex': times.kharkiv.ua/ru/2022/06/24/…

In it we also find several photos of the swimming pool after the rocket impact. πŸ“Έ 13/...
We only see damage on the north side of the swimming pool, where the swimming pool 🟦 is adjacent to the multipurpose sports hall 🟧.

➑️ The limited damage to the swimming pool is therefore a consequence of the rocket impacts on the multipurpose sports hall. 14/...
CONCLUSION: Yes, this sports complex in Kharkiv was heavily damaged, most likely after a recent Russian missile attack.

However, the photo collage shows two different sports halls, a more accurate comparison would look like this:
What have we learned? πŸ‘©β€πŸ«

1) Comparing visual clues from multiple sources helps you understand what happened. πŸ‘οΈ
2) Aerial images or drone footage are πŸ₯‡to understand architecture. 🚁
3) Before/after collages can be a strong visual tool, but be careful when you make one. ⚠️ 16/..
You can read my full article with all sources used here (@Knack) for FREE. πŸ‘‡17/...

knack.be/factcheck/fact…
@Knack Did you learn something from this #OSINT for #FactChecking?

Follow me (@brechtcastel) and check out my channel on #YouTube: youtube.com/channel/UCMBPt… πŸ™

Older 🧡🧡underneath this tweet: 18/END

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More from @brechtcastel

May 4, 2023
You come across a video in a language you don't understand. Annoying. 😠

Wouldn't it be great if you could watch that video with English subtitles? 😍

You can! With a little help from AI!
#OSINT #tutorial πŸ‘‡1/...

(got the idea from @matt0177 πŸ™) Image
@matt0177 First thing you have to do is install Whisper (this is software from #OpenAI, same guys from #ChatGPT).

It's FREE, but not so easy to install. I used this tutorial:

All info on Whisper here: github.com/openai/whisper 2/...
@matt0177 If you installed Whisper correctly, you download the video on your PC and go to the folder where the video is.

Now you type "cmd", to open command-line-interface. 3/... Image
Read 11 tweets
Jan 30, 2023
3.3M views for this video by @EuromaidanPress:

"American πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ infantry fighting vehicles M2 Bradley are spotted in Poland πŸ‡΅πŸ‡± [...] toward the Ukrainian border πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦. "

TRUE βœ… or FALSE ❌? Investigate! πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡ 1/...

#OSINT πŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸŽ₯
#GeoLocation 🌍
#HowToOSINT 🧐
@EuromaidanPress The exact location of the video is difficult to find due to the limited visual elements in the background. 😒

But it's admittedly plausible that the video was shot in Poland. How do we know this? πŸ‘‡2/...
@EuromaidanPress On the locomotive we read PKP Cargo 🟨, which is the largest rail freight carrier in Poland πŸ‡΅πŸ‡±.

We find a picture of a PKP-locomotive with the same serial number ST44-1232 πŸŸ₯.

The road sign in the video 🟩 corresponds to the Polish W9 sign for train signals. 3/...
Read 18 tweets
Nov 24, 2022
"Ukrainians πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡¦ in the World Cup of Qatar πŸ‡ΆπŸ‡¦ arrested for spreading Nazi symbols."

This "report from Al Jazeera" gets 391K views on Telegram. 😲

Fake or real? Let's investigate!πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡1/...

#OSINTπŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸ“½οΈ
#GeoLocation 🌍
#HowToOSINT 🧐
#WorldcupQatar2022 ⚽️ Image
"Three drunken Ukrainian supporters were arrested in Qatar. The reason? They made a Nazi salute and vandalised posters at the Al Bayt stadium by drawing a Hitler moustache on the World Cup mascot La'eeb. When arrested, they showed no resistance."

Source: @AlJazeera Really? πŸ€”2/ Image
@AlJazeera The video features Al Jazeera's official logo πŸ‘†, has high quality and looks professionally made.

Any video on aljazeera.com (right) has an almost identical layout to the video circulating on social media (left). 3/... Image
Read 22 tweets
Oct 18, 2022
"Happy Birthday for Vladimir Putin from Belgium πŸ‡§πŸ‡ͺ" from men in army uniform with guns. πŸ€”

Let's investigate this deleted TikTok-video. πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡1/...

#OSINTπŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸ“½οΈ
#GeoLocation 🌍
#HowToOSINT 🧐
This is the video. πŸ“½οΈπŸ‘€ 2/...

Is this a real video shot in Belgium❓

The video was previously uploaded on the social networking site TikTok on the account '@batyab.e.a.r', we can tell by the caption with the TikTok logo 🟨. 3/...
Read 23 tweets
Sep 21, 2022
11.8M views for a TikTok of "a mosquito 🦟 with a number on its back". 😲

Is Bill Gates involved? (Spoiler: no.) Investigate! πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡1/...

#OSINTπŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸŽ₯
#HowToOSINT 🧐

#BillGates #TikTok #FactCheck #Weird
The Russian caption (albeit with typo) on this viral video reads: 'Guys who know where the numbers on mosquitoes come from (?)'.

Good question! Let's start with some basic Google... 2/...
tiktok.com/@dyunh519yip1/…
To find out the origin of the images, we google part of the Russian inscription.

So we come to an article on the Kazakh news site Ekspress.

That article features the same video and situates it in Kazakhstan. πŸ‡°πŸ‡Ώ3/...
Read 19 tweets
Sep 9, 2022
On Facebook and Twitter hundreds of thousands saw a video of "Queen Elizabeth feeding vulnerable kids...😭😭😭"

Is this #QueenElizabeth "feeding humans as if they are animals"?

Let's find out! πŸ‘‡πŸ§΅1/...

#OSINTπŸ”Ž
#Verification πŸ“½οΈ
#HowToOSINT 🧐
We take a screenshot of the video and load it into the Russian search engine Yandex. #ReverseImageSearch

This brings us to a site with film recommendations. πŸŸ₯2/...
The French title of that page πŸ‘‡ reads 'Annamite children collect sapΓ¨ques for the pagoda of the ladies'.

SapΓ¨que is an ancient Chinese coinage. πŸͺ™

Annamite refers to a mountain range ⛰️ on the border of Vietnam πŸ‡»πŸ‡³ and the neighbouring countries of Laos πŸ‡±πŸ‡¦ and Cambodia πŸ‡°πŸ‡­. 3/
Read 13 tweets

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