At least Brian is a plausibly independent (from powerful governments) blogger who occasionally publishes some high-signal, low-noise content. Although this sort of doxxing is out of hand even if Russians are "fair game" to his Western audience.
I followed Bellingcat and Navalny Team pretty closely for many years. I dislike some of the people behind both organisations but I am sure both organisations contribute to the society in a positive way.
Anyone who did above average things exposes themselves to privacy violations. This is recognized universally for politicians, for instance, otherwise why would we require our representantives to publish their tax declarations or simply campaign publicly?
Basically, Bellingcat is an "intelligence launderer" for the NATO-aligned IC. Agencies can feed them real or bogus intel and they will gladly publish it in return for $$$ and media clout. In some cases, they even fabricate propaganda as in the case of their collaborations with Navalny's team. I think they are closer to "useful idiots" rather than actual intelligence operatives, though.
What they are not is a largely independent OSINT group a la WikiLeaks. Bellingcat is firmly aligned with the most powerful government intelligence agencies on the planet and a darling to their media. They can be counted on to never undermine NATO's agenda (which Julian Assange is suffering immensely for doing), and are ostensibly compensated well for that.
[1] - https://thegrayzone.com/2021/03/24/author-bellingcat-opcw-wh...
This in not much of a proof. Max has been a regular contributor to Russia Today, the infamous tarpit of journalism.