1/23 The Epstein Video: Edits, Manipulation and the Hunt for MJCOLE~1 Over the last two weeks my research from myself and outlets like @WIRED has repeatedly shown the Epstein video was edited.
2/23 The first damning fact was that the video timestamps showed 11 full hours from 7:40pm to 6:40am, despite the video file being almost 8 minutes short.
3/23 While 1 one of these minutes was the nightly reset, my own stopwatch analysis showed that the length of 1 minute on the timestamp was not consistent with 29.97 FPS footage, suggesting it had been manually altered.
4/23 @WIRED had also confirmed with independent video analysts that the two files were stitched together, saved multiple times, but the raw footage had removed almost 2 minutes and 53 seconds from the start of the second clip.
5/23 Meaning that the timestamp was certainly manipulated to show a consistent time despite the alteration of this footage. I also noticed that at specific timestamps we could see a mouse move, showing we were seeing a screen recording and not raw footage.
6/23 In this process, @WIRED also identified that a username MJCOLE~1 was the one who edited the footage - but claimed no more information could be found about him from the metadata.
7/23 On July 11th, I had identified MJCOLE~1 and repeatedly tried to give this information to WIRED but was repeatedly brushed off. I wanted to ensure responsible disclosure. However, his name has made it on to the internet via other sources, and so now I can reveal what I
8/23 1) On a Windows system a username ending in ~1 is a truncation for length, meaning we knew the last name was longer. 2) A review of FBI email formats shows they use middle initials in emails and usernames when their are conflicting
9/23 So searching for permutations of M Cole**** at the FBI was the first step, which turned up a few results, including a Matthew C. who was a video communications specialist.
10/23 But cached Google results specifically note his name as Matthew J. Coleman
11/23 His hiring history notes he started in April 2018. And it just so happens that in June of 2018, the "Exactis" data leak, leaked FBI emails for the first time (among more than 340M records) So if this is our guy he should have an email in data leaks that we can find on
12/23 And as it turns out his exact email, and likely FBI computer login name, were indeed compromised in the Exactis leak. I'm not going to post the exact email of a federal agent but it can easily be inferred.
13/23 The meta data in the video has been entirely left in place, including the entire edit list of cuts and splices. Which @StefanPatatu was kind enough to dump: https://x.com/StefanPatatu/sta...
14/23 What's important here is the metadata includes cut times and encoded hashes of the videos used i.e: SHA256(`video1.mp4`) = ab4105a6da3b053f217e432987ac63cd02ab8ffc9ee99532deff922491d79956
15/23 This means if the FBI provided the original input files we could verify: A) They are the original inputs. B) If you make all the edits listed, you get the exact same output as was released.
16/23 But this could also be a red herring. Because, this footage still wasn't a raw export, video1.mp4 and video2.mp4 were *playbacks* of the footage playing on a computer, as we saw when the mouse moved
17/23 It's entirely possible that the footage was altered, then the playback was recorded on two separate videos, and edited into one video with a number of ghost edits (cutting useless benign stuff) A tactic often used in intelligence releases.
18/23 This process would allow them to leave metadata available, and when questioned, provide the source inputs that resolve to the hash, and claim that nothing serious was altered. A clever way to re-direct and to tell partial truths when under oath.
19/23 The only way to be sure, would be to have Matthew J. Coleman give his sworn under oath testimony to Congress with a direct line of questioning And to release the Epstein files.
20/23 I was hoping journalists would reach Matthew for comment, or Congress could bring him in as a potential whistleblower, but I was clearly not the only person to find his name. And after it came out yesterday who he was, his LinkedIn was deleted
21/23 Now it's important to note, it is possible Matthew has done nothing wrong here and is just an innocent civil servant. It's possible these video edits were truly benign or that the footage was altered long before it got to Matthew.
22/23 While there is overwhelming red flags with this case that point to the guilt of someone, we do not have clarity on when manipulation happened or why. Which is why I hoped for responsible disclosure, and why we must have a Congressional inquiry.
23/23 Matthew J. Coleman can either entirely justify why 8 minutes in total are missing from this footage. Or, he is entirely aware of what was hidden. Either way, the American public needs answers - and if his superiors won't do the right thing and release the files, then its
PS - Once again H/T to @StefanPatatu for his look at the metadata, and to the Twitter users who got screenshots of Coleman's social profiles before they went dark. PPS - Wired, a good lesson to actually follow up with tips. PPPS - Nothing in this thread should imply guilt, and
@StefanPatatu Small addendum: The hashes were hashed from @StefanPatatu which lets us still compare the files but also proves he didn't do any editing to them either. These hashes were not in the metadata themselves. Doesn't change the outcome - just didn't want to confuse any other
@StefanPatatu Another interesting note, the encoding standard adobe uses lists 29.97 fps as (30,000/1001) so we have the exact encoding tick math. If there was no edits, each timestamp minute would be 59.94 seconds, resulting in only 39.64 seconds of lost time in 11 hours. Instead, there are
