CPJ Blog

Press Freedom News and Views

Frank Smyth

Frank Smyth is CPJ’s senior adviser for journalist security. He has reported on armed conflicts, organized crime, and human rights from nations including El Salvador, Guatemala, Colombia, Cuba, Rwanda, Uganda, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan, Jordan, and Iraq. Follow him on Twitter @JournoSecurity.

Journalist Security Blog

In 2 major efforts, journalist security tailored to fit

By Frank Smyth/CPJ Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
Two major security efforts coincide with World Press Freedom Day.

In the past, donors and groups providing security to journalists in less-developed nations tended to export a Western, military-style of training designed for a war-time environment. But the danger of covering combat is one thing. Being fired upon by a motorcycle-riding assassin is another--as is being sexually molested in a crowd, discovering a video camera in one's bedroom, or having one's phone calls intercepted. And then there is emotional toll of losing dear colleagues, and wondering whether you or your family will be next.

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April 30, 2013 11:18 AM ET | | Comments (0)
Tags: Journalist Security, Sexual Violence, State Department, Surveillance, UNESCO
Journalist Security Blog | USA

Attacks on Knight Center sites reflect digital dangers

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security

The two websites at the University of Texas at Austin, at first blush, seemed to have been unlikely targets for attack. The Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas and its blog cover news about journalism, press freedom and journalist safety throughout the Western hemisphere, with an emphasis on trends in Latin America. The website of the International Symposium for Online Journalism provides information about meetings and other professional issues. Both websites were shut down for two weeks last month in a targeted cyber-attack.

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April 5, 2013 12:49 PM ET | | Comments (0) | Also in Español
Tags: Denial of Service, Hacking, Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas, Malware, Ríodoce, Surveillance
Journalist Security Blog | Iraq, USA

Iraq war and news media: A look inside the death toll

By Frank Smyth/CPJ Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
An Iraqi journalist walks past a wall of photos of journalists killed during the Iraq War. (AP/Samir Mizban)

The U.S.-led war in Iraq claimed the lives of a record number of journalists and challenged some commonly held perceptions about the risks of covering conflict. Far more journalists, for example, were murdered in targeted killings in Iraq than died in combat-related circumstances. Here, on the 10th anniversary of the start of the war, is a look inside the data collected by CPJ.

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March 18, 2013 4:24 PM ET | | Comments (1)
Tags: Atwar Bahjat, Iraq war, Killed, Mazen Dana, Michael Kelly, Steven Vincent
Journalist Security Blog | Kenya

In tense climate, Kenyan press can draw on solidarity

By Frank Smyth/CPJ Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
A supporter of Raila Odinga, a presidential candidate who was defeated last week by Uhura Kenyatta. (AFP/Jennifer Huxta)

Amid a tense presidential election, Kenyans have avoided a repeat of the deadly violence that followed the vote in 2007, when half a million people were uprooted and more than 1,000 people were killed. Still, the situation today is fraught. Ethnic identity dominates the nation's political divisions--and those same loyalties can undermine solidarity in the press corps.

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March 11, 2013 3:57 PM ET |
Tags: Attacked, Elections, Harassed, Intimidated, Journalist Security, Legal Action, Raila Odinga, Shaka Ssali, Threatened, Uhura Kenyatta
Journalist Security Blog | Afghanistan, Mexico, Somalia, Syria

Do news blackouts help journalists held captive?

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
An image grab from a YouTube video uploaded on December 18 allegedly shows NBC employees, from left to right, Aziz Akyavas, Richard Engel, and John Kooistra in captivity in Syria. (AFP/YouTube)

At any given time over the past two years, as wars raged in Libya and then Syria, and as other conflicts ground on in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, a number of journalists have been held captive by a diverse array of forces, from militants and rebels to criminals and paramilitaries. And at any given time, a small handful of these cases--sometimes one or two, sometimes more--have been purposely kept out of the news media. That is true today.

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February 26, 2013 11:44 AM ET |
Tags: Abducted, Al-Hurra, Alain Buu, Austin Tice, Bashar Fahmi, CBS, Daniel Pearl, David Rohde, Franck Fwamba, Gad Gross, Gawker, Global Post, James Foley, Killed, McClatchy, Mellissa Fung, Mining News, Missing, Mohamed al-Saeed, NBC, Richard Engel, Syrian State TV, The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Thomson Reuters, Tina Susman
Journalist Security Blog | Iraq, Somalia, Syria

Combat deaths at a high, risks shift for journalists

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
Ambulances carry the bodies of Marie Colvin and Rémi Ochlik, who were killed in government shelling in Syria. (Reuters/Khaled al-Hariri)

Murder is the leading cause of work-related deaths among journalists worldwide--and this year was no exception. But the death toll in 2012 continued a recent shift in the nature of journalist fatalities worldwide. More journalists were killed in combat situations in 2012 than in any year since 1992, when CPJ began keeping detailed records.

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December 18, 2012 12:00 AM ET | | Comments (2)
Tags: Al-Shabaab, Ali Shaaban, Blogger, Homs, Internet, Killed, Marie Colvin, Rémi Ochlik, Shaam News Network
Journalist Security Blog | Brazil, India, Pakistan, Philippines, Somalia, Syria

Will UN plan address impunity, security for journalists?

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
A woman stands next to a banner reading "No more impunity" in Colombia. (AFP/Raul Arboleda)

Here are the facts:

  • A journalist is killed in the line of duty somewhere around the world once every eight days.
  • Nearly three out of four are targeted for murder. The rest are killed in the crossfire of combat, or on dangerous assignments such as street protests.
  • Local journalists constitute the large majority of victims in all groups.
  • The murderers go unpunished in about nine out of 10 cases.
  • The overall number of journalists killed, and the number of journalists murdered, have each climbed since the 1990s.

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November 13, 2012 1:31 PM ET | | Comments (1)
Tags: Abdel Karim al-Oqda, Abdul Haq Baloch, Impunity, International Day to End Impunity, Killed, Mohamed Mohamed Turyare, UNESCO
Journalist Security Blog | USA

CIA case highlights need for digital security

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
Ex-CIA officer John Kiriakou has pleaded guilty to leaking information to a journalist. (AP/Cliff Owen)

Few cases better underscore the need for digital security among journalists. On Tuesday, ex-CIA officer John Kiriakou pleaded guilty to leaking the identity of another CIA operative to Matthew Cole, a journalist formerly with an ABC News investigative team. In a 2007 interview with ABC, Kiriakou became the first CIA official to confirm that waterboarding had been used on Al-Qaeda suspects.

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October 24, 2012 1:49 PM ET |
Tags: ABC News, Al-Qaeda, CIA, David H. Petraeus, Email, John Kiriakou, Journalist Security, Matthew Cole, Richard Esposito, Scott Shane, The New York Times
Journalist Security Blog | Ukraine

Finding common cause from first online journalist murder

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security
Georgy Gongadze, shown here the summer of 2000, was the first online journalist killed in retaliation for his work. (AFP/Dima Gavrish)

The first online journalist killed for his work disappeared one night 12 years ago in the Ukraine. Georgy Gongadze, 31, left a colleague's house to return home to his wife and two young children. He never arrived. Seven weeks later, a farmer, a few hours' drive away, discovered the journalist's headless corpse.

Gongadze edited the website Ukrainska Pravda and ran stories about corruption and cronyism like no one else in the nation's state-dominated print and broadcast media. Later, the country's then-president was implicated in an audiotape in which he was allegedly heard speaking to aides about the need for Gongadze's murder.

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October 12, 2012 2:36 PM ET |
Tags: Abdel Karim al-Oqda, Aleksei Pukach, Blogger, Facebook, Georgy Gongadze, Impunity, Internet, Killed, Leonid Kuchma, Social Media, Twitter, Ukrainska Pravda
Journalist Security Blog

In Cryptocat, lessons for technologists and journalists

By Frank Smyth/Senior Adviser for Journalist Security

Alhamdulillah! Finally, a technologist designed a security tool that everyone could use. A Lebanese-born, Montreal-based computer scientist, college student, and activist named Nadim Kobeissi had developed a cryptography tool, Cryptocat, for the Internet that seemed as easy to use as Facebook Chat but was presumably far more secure.

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September 11, 2012 12:12 PM ET | | Comments (2)
Tags: Cryptocat, Hacked, Internet, Martus, Nadim Kobeissi, Patrick Ball, Pretty Good Privacy, Tor
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