Global Investigative Journalism Network (https://archive.gijn.org/tag/threats-to-safety/)
A press freedom crisis is rippling across Latin America and in some places the technological, legal, and physical threats have grown so severe that investigative journalists feel compelled to flee their home countries to keep reporting.
Independent media now have to deal with an increasing number of digital attacks on press freedom, from brute-force attacks on their servers to more sophisticated assaults on their social media presence and digitally-based legal challenges.
Afghan journalist Zahra Joya, 28, is not hopeful of a bright future for women journalists in her country. In November 2020, she used her personal savings to recruit five women journalists and start Rukhshana Media. They wanted to go around the country and tell the stories of maternal mortality, domestic violence and women’s reproductive health. Since then, they have published stories on the taboo of menstruation, child marriage, street harassment, gender discrimination and what it means to live as a survivor of rape.
The US Justice Department indicted five Iranian intelligence officials last week, alleging they were part of a plot to surveil and eventually abduct an Iranian-American investigative journalist living in the US. Read the indictment.
While precarious employment, low pay and trumped up defamation lawsuits means Italian journalists are under increasing financial pressure, it’s the constant threat from mafia and organized crime that is putting reporters at risk and making in-depth reporting that much more difficult.