Applications Invited for Bellingcat Tech Fellowship

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About the Organization

Bellingcat is an independent investigative collective of researchers, investigators and citizen journalists brought together by a passion for open source research.

Founded in 2014, we have pioneered the use of open source research methods to investigate a variety of subjects of public interest. These range from the shooting down of flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine to police violence in Colombia and the illegal wildlife trade in the UAE. Our research is regularly referenced by international media and has been cited by several courts and investigative missions.

We design and share verifiable methods of ethical digital investigation. By publishing walkthroughs to open source research methods and holding tailored training sessions on their use for journalists, human rights activists and members of the public, we’re broadening the scope and application of open source research.

About the Fellowship

Would you like to develop tools or methods that can support online researchers? Do you have a project idea that could benefit the open source research community? 

Bellingcat’s Tech Fellowship could be the opportunity to do just that.

We are looking for self-motivated fellows to develop tools for the open source research community.

This fellowship is offered for a duration of 3 months, from January to March 2025, with a monthly stipend of 1,000 EUR.

Scope of the fellowship:

We welcome pitches for tool development across all areas and aspects of digital investigations. You can find an overview of existing tools in Bellingcat’s Online Open Source Investigation Toolkit and can take a look at previously published pieces by the investigative tech team.

There are no limitations to the topics or areas of tool development, provided the project will be useful for online researchers and can be completed within 3 months.

How the fellowship works:

You should apply with a short tool description and a plan of how you intend to develop this over the timescale of the fellowship. If you are selected, you will then define and agree on indicative milestones with Bellingcat’s Investigative Tech Team (we understand that these milestones may shift based on development challenges).

Fellows are free to work on tool development in a way that is best suited to their personal needs and should expect to manage their own time while working remotely.

If the fellowship work meets Bellingcat’s standards, project material may be published on Bellingcat’s GitHub. There may also be the opportunity to publish work via our other community and social media channels.

All tools must be released under an open source software licence.

Fellows will receive a stipend of 1,000 EUR per month during their fellowship.

Eligibility

We welcome applications from a variety of backgrounds. The main requirement is having the technical skills necessary for your project. Applicants should balance complexity and feasibility in the pitch, aiming for a project that is deliverable in the short timescale.

It does not matter to us how you acquired the necessary skills to build your tool. There is no need to have any academic degrees. We welcome self-taught individuals if they can demonstrate the requisite skills.

We are committed to helping create a diverse, open source developer community.

How to Apply

Email your application to contact-tech@bellingcat.com including “Tech Fellowship” in the subject line.

Please send a CV, and a concise pitch document (no longer than 1000 words) answering the following questions:

What do you want to build and why?

Include a description of the project and a summary of how it helps online researchers.

What is your development plan?

Give a brief overview of your proposed project milestones. We suggest listing what you aim to accomplish each month as bullet points.

Who are you and what are your relevant skills?

Provide information about yourself and your most-relevant technical skills. You can also share or describe some past projects you have worked on.

You can view an example application here.

For more information please check the Link

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