Advanced Satellite Imagery Techniques for Open Source Investigation Webinar

Two day, eight hour online training
24-25 September 2026, 9 am – 1 pm EDT New York time/ 3 -7 pm CEST Amsterdam time
Price: EUR 700

The ready availability of high-quality satellite images means that if you’re not using them in your open source investigations, you may be missing out on important findings. From determining damage to military bases by kamikaze drones to measuring the impact of oil spills, knowing where to find satellite images and how to interpret them is an indispensable skill for any open source investigator.

This webinar builds on Bellingcat’s Geolocation, Maps and Satellites and Chronolocation webinar, and assumes familiarity with basic satellite imagery tools, including Google Earth and Copernicus Browser.

What you will learn:

Participants will come away with:

An understanding of the differences between various types of satellite imagery including optical imagery, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery, multispectral and hyperspectral imagery, and how different types of imagery can be used for open source investigations
An understanding of the different types of geospatial data, including raster and vector file formats
Familiarity with using Copernicus Hub for visualizing multispectral satellite imagery, and examples of its use in investigations
Practice interpreting SAR imagery in a variety of contexts, including analyzing environmental disasters, tracking military movements, and investigating maritime activity
Experience using QGIS to visualize and interpret raw satellite imagery
Experience using QGIS to combine satellite imagery with other open source geospatial data, including government records and OpenStreetMap
Experience using QGIS to annotate and share analysis of satellite imagery
An understanding of how AI can be used with satellite imagery, and how this differs from more conventional “chatbot” AIs
Practice using AI tools for similar object detection and locating dark ships and oil spills at sea
Practice using Google Earth Engine to quantitatively analyze Sentinel-2 imagery
Practice using Google Earth Engine to perform change detection and analysis using geospatial foundation models

Experience level:

This webinar is for people who are familiar with the use of satellite imagery for research, such as Google Maps and Street View, Copernicus Browser and have awareness of alternate satellite imagery sources and mapping services.

This webinar is not for people with a novice-to-intermediate familiarity of satellite services and tools.

Logistics:

The webinar will be led by experienced Bellingcat researchers who will guide you through the material. They have extensive open source research experience and are passionate about sharing their knowledge with you.

Zoom webinar joining details will be shared with participants in the week before the training.

Not ready for this level yet:

In case you think you’re not ready to join this webinar, please check our website for upcoming training better matching your needs.

Cancellation

Please look closely at the cancellation and event policies in Eventzilla before you take the leap.

FAQs

Why Bellingcat?

Bellingcat is a global collective that has uncovered facts to hold power to account — we share everything, including our methods, because truth belongs to everyone.

Bellingcat began by analyzing footage of chemical weapons attacks in the Syrian civil war back in 2014. In recent years we have worked on covering various topics from civilian harm in Ukraine, through wildlife trafficking in South East Asia, the recruitment of child soldiers in Africa to the luxurious life of Kinahan cartel leaders living openly in Dubai despite an international manhunt.

We turn that same curiosity into a teachable research skill. Combined with practical knowledge of techniques and tools, that’s what this workshop teaches you to do.

How do you screen participants?

We manually approve all applications after registration. We do basic due diligence checks on our participants to be sure that our trainers and all other participants are comfortable with their participation. Members of any police, military or intelligence service are not permitted registration at our workshops, and we allow government employees to join on a case-by-case basis.

Bellingcat reserves the right not to disclose the reasons for declining participation.

That said, the vast majority of participants are approved without any issue.

Who usually attends your workshops?

We have a pretty interesting mix of participants at our trainings. Between a third to a half come from private companies or the corporate world. Among those, we have plenty of information security researchers, corporate security investigators, lawyers, due diligence experts, and other professions. Journalists are the next-most popular profession for our workshops, and then we have a mix of human rights/NGO researchers, academics and students, and even retirees just curious about what this whole OSINT thing is all about.

Can I get an invoice?

In case you need an invoice, please send us an email to [email protected].

Can I receive a certificate for the workshops?

Sure! Just email us ([email protected]) after the workshops, and we’ll send you a PDF certificate.

Can I receive a recording of a workshop?

We do not record our workshops, or allow others to record them. However, we do provide copies of our training slides to participants after the completion of the training for their personal reference.

Can I gift a workshop seat to someone else?

Sure! We have had quite a few people buy workshop attendance for a loved one as a birthday or Christmas gift. Just let us know the name of the person who you are buying the seat for when registration so that we can do a basic due diligence check on them (see the Screening section up above). Feel free to email us at [email protected] to make sure we have their proper contact details so they get all of the invitation information on time.