Digital Safety

39 results arranged by date

Security keys, like the one pictured, are the safest way to secure online accounts. (CPJ)

Digital Safety: Using security keys to secure accounts against phishing

Hackers are using more sophisticated methods to target journalists, including those who use two-step authentication (2FA).

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A man walks through rubble in Damascus in October 2018, caused by years of war. Safety remains a key concern for Syrian journalists. (AP/Hassan Ammar)

Damascus journalist has a million stories but none she can safely report

Joudy Boulos has a million stories she wants to write. But as a Syrian freelance journalist living in Damascus, her ability to report is severely limited by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. It is so dangerous that “Joudy Boulos” is a pseudonym the journalist sometimes uses when reporting and to protect her safety.…

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Artwork: Jack Forbes

Digital safety: Protecting against online harassment

Journalists are frequently at risk of being targeted online for their work. Media workers who cover issues such as the alt-right, politics and contentious elections, as well as movements linked to race or gender are at higher risk of being attacked online.

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Mexican journalist Carmen Aristegui holds her mobile phone during a press conference in Mexico City in 2017 about governments using spyware to target journalist. (AFP/Alfredo Estrella)

CPJ Safety Advisory: Pegasus spyware used to target journalists, civil society

[EDITOR’S NOTE: See CPJ’s updated safety advisory here https://cpj-preprod.go-vip.net/2019/11/cpj-safety-advisory-journalist-targets-of-pegasus-.php.] In a report published on September 18, Citizen Lab said it had detected Pegasus, a spyware created for mobile devices, in over 45 countries. Pegasus, which transforms a cellphone into a mobile surveillance station, could have been deployed against a range of journalists and civil society…

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Artwork: Jack Forbes

Physical and digital safety: Civil disorder

Reporting on crowd violence or mobs can be dangerous, and every year journalists are injured covering such stories.

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Artwork: Jack Forbes

Digital safety

Journalists should be aware of the dangers of digital attacks, including through hacking, phishing, and surveillance, and should take steps to protect themselves, their sources, and their work.

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Artwork: Jack Forbes

Basic preparedness: Risk assessment

Decisions journalists make in the field have direct bearing on their safety and that of others. The risks inherent in covering war, political unrest, and crime can never be eliminated, but careful planning and risk assessment can mitigate the dangers.

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Chinese Import

Russia tries to emulate Beijing’s model of information control By Emily Parker Russia has embarked on an ambitious social experiment. Just a few years ago, Russians had a mostly free internet. Now Moscow is looking toward Beijing, trying to imitate the Chinese model of internet control. Yet the Kremlin will likely find that once you…

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CPJ Safety Advisory: Trolls and online abuse

Today the Committee to Protect published a blog post detailing increased online harassment to journalists in the United States. Trolling and online abuse of journalists and bloggers, however, is a global threat. At a time when use of Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms are a job requirement for media workers, trolls have become…

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