Are Donors Taking the Journalism Crisis Seriously? An Analysis of Official Aid to Media 2010–2019

To secure the future of independent journalism, international aid is critical. And yet, the international assistance community is not meeting the needs of a sector in danger of extinction. Support for media has languished at 0.3 percent of total official development assistance.

Digital Trust Initiatives: Seeking to Reward Journalistic Ethics Online

What can be done to restore public trust and improve the financial viability of independent journalism when news dissemination is increasingly mediated by digital platforms? Digital trust initiatives provide one possible solution.

Chilling Legislation: Tracking the Impact of “Fake News” Laws on Press Freedom Internationally

As an increasing number of countries have passed legislation meant to combat the spread of misinformation, disinformation, and mal-information, journalists and news organizations around the world are getting caught in the crosshairs.

Internet Governance and Media Development

While at first blush discussions about digital regulation, technical protocols, and infrastructure may seem distant from the concerns of news media, in fact, they ultimately have a direct impact on who is able to access the internet and how that information flows on the global network.

This series of videos introduces viewers to key issues in internet governance and explains how they impact broader media development efforts. Internet governance refers to all of the policies, processes, and technologies that structure of the Internet.

These videos present concrete examples of how different aspects of internet governance affect news producers and consumers. Together, these episodes point to the urgent need for a conversation among journalists, civil society activists, policymakers, engineers, and digital media companies about how the internet should be governed to safeguard the health of the public sphere in countries around the world.

Episode 1: The “Right to be Forgotten”

Episode One shows how the “right to be forgotten” that various countries are beginning to enforce can protect people from the stigma of an embarrassing past but might also limit access to important information of public interest.

Episode 2: Encryption

Episode Two illustrates the importance of digital security for journalists and activists in an era of increasing online surveillance and how improvements in technical encryption standards can help create the conditions for free speech to thrive.

Episode 3. Zero-rating

Episode Three introduces the concept of “zero-rating,” the policy of providing free but limited internet that is becoming popular in the developing world, and warns of the danger that zero-rating creates an uneven playing field in the online market for news.

Episode 4. Sustainability

Episode Four demonstrates how social media platforms’ decisions about how to display and rank content can have dramatic effects on news producers’ abilities to reach audiences.

CIMA welcomes you to use and reproduce the series as an educational and awareness-raising tool. Small-file versions of each episode that you can download and share via email or messaging app are available here: Part 1: The Right to Be Forgotten”, Part 2: Encryption, Part 3: Zero-rating, and Part 4: Sustainability.


Read more of CIMA’s work on Internet Governance