Global Investigative Journalism Network (https://archive.gijn.org/category/press-freedom/)
The Kyiv Independent was launched just months before the start of the war in Ukraine. In her keynote address at the CIJ summer conference, the outlet’s editor-in-chief spoke about the challenges of running an investigative project in the midst of conflict, and how the team have battled to make the organization sustainable.
The methods and tools that governments employ to censor and control the internet, and the tools and ways to get around censorship, are a constantly shifting battleground. But there is a set of evergreen best practices and helpful software that are useful.
Three years after the Myanmar military’s violent coup, journalists continue to struggle with press freedom and are trying to rebuild independent media voices in support of democracy both inside and outside the country.
The 2023 edition of the Freedom in the World report, produced by US nonprofit Freedom House, was released today. This is the 50th year of the study, which tracks global trends and compiles individual country reports on political rights and liberties.
Hungarian investigative media outlet Átlátszó and its editor-in-chief, Tamás Bodoky, have become targets in the latest smear campaign by pro-government news outlets, aimed at discrediting what remains of the country’s independent media.
To confront the ongoing legal threats to independent media around the world, the Vance Center and OCCRP are launching Reporters Shield, a multi-million dollar legal support program and defense fund for investigative journalism and newsrooms.
Like spyware, forensic tools can access everything on a phone or computer, but unlike spyware, such tools are in widespread, open usage in democracies as well as more repressive regimes. Their use has accelerated threats to the press while protections and public awareness lag behind.
The Uğur Mumcu Investigative Journalism Foundation — a GIJN member since 2018 — plays a unique role in Turkey. Decades after its creation, it is still training investigative journalists in the country’s increasingly polarized media environment.
Intrepid journalists are still conducting investigations on countries within the Arab Gulf region, but due to political repression and other press freedom issues, they’ve had to report from afar or build and operate their independent media sites while in exile.
Because of growing threats to democracy, and a recent series of ever more extreme societal and planetary crises, funders now see more clearly the pivotal, central role that independent public interest media play in keeping our societies and economies open. And what’s even more encouraging is to see this positive talk backed up with concrete measures and actions.
Radio Zamaneh Executive Director Joris van Duijne discusses how his exile media site is reporting from afar on the widespread political protests reverberating across Iran.