Clearing the Fog of Chaos with Evidence

Malachy Browne, co-director of the Visual Investigations team at the New York Times, came to Columbia Journalism School this week to speak to students about using open source investigation tools to cover conflict zones. 

Malachy Browne giving his speech to students at Columbia Journalism School in October 2023. Credit: Silence ByK Photography

Browne’s team previously won a duPont for their documentary “Day of Rage,” which combined crowd-sourced videos, data analysis and deep reporting to intricately recreate the January 6 insurrection moment-by-moment from the perspective of the Capitol rioters. 

In his talk, he walked through some of his team’s processes in gathering information and verifying them, citing “Day of Rage” as an example. 

“We can clear away the fog of chaos around something like the Capitol riot, because there's just so much material there,” said Browne.

One example he delved into was the team’s analysis of how an Israeli soldier killed Palestinian medic Rouzan al-Najjar. He talked through how the team used a combination of metadata from video footage, 3D modeling, and traditional on-the-ground reporting to “freeze that moment” Rouzan was killed. 

“When that story ran, you know, it was criticized both by Israel and by Palestinian activists, and groups in Palestine” said Browne. “It was a truth that cut through the narrative.”

“Was she intentionally singled out at shot dead? Not quite. Was she a protester on the field who deserved to be injured or nullified somehow? Absolutely not. That’s often what happens in a story like this,” said Browne.

He said that’s the value in this sort of investigative work. “The news sometimes can be colored,” said Browne.

“But taking an investigative approach to things with hard evidence that's really analytical and lays things out very simply and explains it in a transparent way how you’re arriving at your conclusions, has the potential, I find, to break through other coverage,” Browne added.

Browne said that they have seen their work referenced in trials, policy discussions, and reforms.

“Our job as journalists is not to achieve justice. It's really to put the information out to the best of our ability,” said Browne. “And there are other mechanisms that use that information if they require.”

Over the past week, he said that the team has just been digging through information coming out of Israel and Gaza and looking at how they can verify it. At the time of this post, the team has put out a video that visually breaks down how a gunman killed dozens in Sderot. 

You can watch Day of Rage here. And you can check out the Visual Investigations team’s other reporting here.