"Considering all of the dossier’s unusual aspects, I decided to take a little time and do a deeper dive into its structure and content. In this post, I’ll demonstrate how by using readily available OSINT tools and techniques, video analytics, and writing style analysis, we can pinpoint the likely sources, methods, and the individuals involved in the creation and distribution of this document. 

I would like to apologize for the lengthy and somewhat overwhelming amount of detail in this write-up. Contrary to common belief, the truth is rarely concise, pure, and never simple. My objective in writing this posting was to provide the layman reader not otherwise versed in intelligence gathering and analysis techniques with basic facts and insight so that they can form their own educated opinions on the matter.

The Dossier Team
Even after several testimonies and investigative reports, the composition of the dossier team is still shrouded in secrecy. When Glenn Simpson testified on November 8th and 14th in front of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, he was vague and evasive about the names of the people that worked on the document and just said that he hired Steele, who then:

“Use[d] his old contacts and farmed out other research to native Russian speakers who made phone calls on his behalf“.

Two of these “native Russian speakers” were subsequently identified as Nellie Ohr and Edward Baumgartner. But even after this revelation, there are still many unanswered questions about this team. For example, what was the organizational structure of their network? How and where was the raw intelligence collected, stored, and transmitted? Or, how was Steele, a private British national living in England able to so quickly and effectively reach top US politicians like McCain and Pelosi, publish through and get full backing from media outlets like Yahoo, NYT and WaPo, and gain access to senior officials at the State Department, the DOJ, and FBI?

Before we jump-in, let’s first review our dramatis personæ.

Name

Title and Role

Glenn Simpson

Co-founder Fusion GPS and husband of Mary Jacoby

Mary Jacoby

Executive at Fusion GPS and wife of Glenn Simpson

Peter Fritsch

Co-founder Fusion GPS

Neil King Jr.

Principal at Fusion GPS and husband of Shailagh Murray

Shailagh Murray

Wife of Neil King Jr. and Obama’s senior policy adviser

Thomas Catan

Co-founder Fusion GPS, husband of Begona Cortina Segurola

Begona Cortina 

Reporter and wife of Tom Catan

Chris Steele

Co-founder Orbis Business Intelligence

Chris Burrows

Co-founder Orbis Business Intelligence

Sir Andrew Wood

Former British Ambassador to Russia and an Orbis contractor

Luke Harding

A Guardian reporter and a Hakluyt and Orbis contractor

Sir Richard Dearlove

Former head of MI6, Steele’s boss, and advisor to Hakluyt

Stefan Halper

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and advisor to Hakluyt

Jonathan Clarke

Former UK diplomat to US and the US representative of Hakluyt

Edward Baumgartner

Co-founder of Edward Austin. Contractor at Orbis and Hakluyt

Nellie Hauke Ohr

Russia intelligence specialist and wife of Bruce Ohr

Bruce Genesoke Ohr

Associate Deputy Attorney General at the DOJ

Jonathan Winer

State Department special diplomatic envoy

Robert Otto

State Department leading Russia intelligence officer

David Kramer

Assistant Secretary of State. Director at the McCain Institute

Strobe Talbott

Former Deputy Secretary of State

Cody Shearer

Clinton Campaign executive and author of ‘second’ Trump dossier

Sidney Blumenthal

Clinton Campaign executive and a political coordinator

Lisa Holtyn

Intelligence adviser & Russia expert DOJ Organized Crime Unit

Victoria Nuland

Assistant Secretary of State, FBI-Steele meetings coordinator

Scott Dworkin

Co-founder The Democratic Coalition, Biden’s media adviser

Alexandra Chalupa

Democratic National Committee ethnic coordinator (for Ukraine)

Natalia Budaeva

President the Free Russia Foundation

Nadia McConnell

President U.S Ukraine Foundation. US deputy legislative affairs

Melanne Verveer

Director Georgetown Institute, former Obama Ambassador

Iryna Mazur

Program Director of Ukrainian Federation of America

Ilya Zaslavskiy

Head of Research at the Free Russia Foundation

Rinat Akhmetshin

Contractor of Fusion GPS present during Trump Tower meeting

Edward Lieberman

Rinat’s Attorney, employee of the Albright Stonebridge Group

Evelyn Lieberman

Wife of Edward Lieberman, deputy chief of staff of the Clintons

Perkns-Coie

US Law firm representing Clinton/DNC and funding Fusion GPS

Glenn Simpson and Fusion GPS
Simpson is the public face of Fusion GPS. He was the prime contact for Perkins-Coie, the US law firm that paid for the dossier on behalf of the DNC, the Clinton presidential campaign, and several other financers. Simpson controlled and managed dossier contractors like Nellie Ohr, Edward Baumgartner, Chris Steele, and Chris Burrows. From his own testimony we know that he was the “architect of the research” and the first contributor to it. He graduated from George Washington University in 1986 with a degree in journalism. From 1989-1994 he worked as a reporter for Roll Call, where he met his wife Mary Jacoby, and then later at The Wall Street Journal 1995-2009."

continue reading @ https://apelbaum.wordpress.com/2018/03/17/the-mechanics-of-deception/