The locations of the bodies in the photos, taken in mid-March, match those from smartphone photos released in early April, allowing the exact date of the massacre to be determined before Russian forces evacuated the city. The image analysis, published by the New York Times, is the latest example of the growing importance of satellite imagery to journalists, investigators and activists seeking to document the evolution of war in Ukraine and gather evidence of war crimes in the region. Along with cheap and affordable drone footage, technology has revolutionized the practice of “open source intelligence” or OSINT, says Eliot Higgins, founder of OSINT Bellingcat. The UN Security Council has considered Ukrainian allegations of mass killings of civilians in Bucha by Russian troops. Photo: Spencer Platt / Getty Images “Syria was where everyone learned the value of satellite imagery when it came to things like that,” Higgins said. “But now, thanks to the work of companies like Planet Labs, we are in a position where we can even outsource satellites a few times a month to specific locations. A lot of people are doing this right now, and everyone is focused on Ukraine, so what we get is lots and lots of good resolution satellite imagery from all over the country. “It simply came to our notice then. So you hear a report and, in a few hours, if you are lucky and the clouds are good enough, you can get a nice high resolution image of what you are looking at. “ Many of the skills used in documenting the Ukrainian battlefield have been sharpened in investigations such as Bellingcat’s examination of the downing of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 by Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine in 2014 and similar efforts to document war crimes in Syria. Matching a satellite imagery area with a photo posted on social media is not a bad thing, but the best OSINT researchers have developed an almost unusual ability to find locations. In the early days, however, researchers were limited by satellite material published in Google Earth, which was often outdated for years. Now, as image providers become more accustomed to the media and activists, they are willing to provide useful photos. But while satellite imagery is more widely available and more responsive, the actual imagery has not changed. “Consumer use of satellite imagery is legally limited to a resolution of 0.25 square meters per pixel, regardless of the capabilities of the cameras in space, and is valid from 2014.” There are better resolution images, we just are not allowed to use them, “he says. Higgins. The world’s armies, of course, have no such limits – as was conclusively demonstrated in 2019, when Donald Trump posted on Twitter a classified image of an extremely high-resolution Iranian rocket launcher.
