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2025-07-11 15:00:23

US President Donald Trump marked the Fourth of July by signing into law a federal budget bill with far-reaching implications for redistributing wealth in the country, since its final version was packed with tax breaks for America’s wealthiest households and deep cuts to Medicaid programs that serve the poor and working class. The Washington Post develops a personalized calculator, allowing readers to explore precisely how the bill will impact them financially. In this edition of our Top 10 in Data Journalism, which considers stories between June 21 to July 9, we also feature Der Spiegel’s interactive on the world’s most risky maritime shipping routes, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s latest deep dive into  cancer drugs exported to over 100 countries, and a project from Nikkei’s Vdata team that uses OSINT techniques to uncover “pig butchering” — or online scamming centers — set up in Myanmar. 

Winners and Losers from Trump’s Big Budget Bill

Image: Screenshot, The Washington Post

After hours of debate, the US House of Representatives passed the cornerstone of President Trump’s second-term agenda, a massive spending bill that is projected to add $3.3 trillion to the national debt over the next decade. The legislation cuts Medicaid and food stamp provisions, adds more to the defense budget, and promises hefty tax cuts to the country’s highest earners. The Washington Post unpacked how the legislation will affect different Americans in an interactive tool using a model developed by the University of Pennsylvania, which takes into account household income, benefits, marital status, and factors such as dependents. Readers can input their own data to understand how their finances could go up or down. For example, the modeling showed a single person earning $80,000 in California will be  have $2,000 more each year as a result of the changes, while a single mother of two earning $20,000 and receiving Medicaid and other benefits is projected to be $870 worse off.

Myanmar’s Scam Centers / Border Prisons

Image: Screenshot, Nikkei

Nikkei’s visual investigation into Myanmar’s scam centers dug into the clandestine compounds where trafficked workers are forced into “pig butchering,” a type of online investment scam that entails building online relationships with victims and tricking them into fake investment schemes. Nikkei’s Vdata team combined satellite imagery, nighttime light analysis, public records, expert interviews, and NGO reports to identify and verify suspected scam centers, which are often built along the borders with Thailand where many workers are from. The team used mobile device location information, and accessed leaked documents linking militant groups to these fraud operations. They pinpointed the precise locations of these hubs on the borders of Myanmar, reveal how they’ve grown into “prisons” ensnaring those who think they’ve been offered a job but instead find themselves trapped in money-driven exploitation schemes.

Deadly Heatwaves Impact Europe

Image: Screenshot, Sky News

The latest heatwave in England likely killed 263 Londoners, according to this report from Sky News which assessed how climate change is impacting heat waves across the country. Although the temperatures — which reached highs of 35˚C (95˚F) — are not as high as those reached in other parts of Europe at the same time, the authors warn that “British classrooms, homes, and hospitals are ill-prepared to deal with increasing temperatures.” The Sky report used data from the Imperial College London Grantham Institute / London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and also dug into European stats on deaths related to climate change and heat, as well as the age groups most at risk of death from heat.

Tankers in the Middle East Line of Fire

Image: Screenshot, Der Spiegel

Amid rising tensions in the Middle East, the Israeli and US attacks on Iranian military and nuclear facilities shook markets. At the center of the turmoil: the Strait of Hormuz, the 50-km (31-mile) wide shipping corridor on Iran’s southern border, through which some 20 million barrels of oil a day are transported — and which Iran has threatened to close. Using maritime traffic data and UN trade and development data, Der Spiegel’s scrollytelling interactive mapped the major maritime bottlenecks around the world including the Suez Canal and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait – which, in 2024, were at the epicenter of Houthi rebel attacks.

Suspect Cancer Drugs Shipped Around the World

Image: Screenshot, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

While roughly one in six deaths worldwide is due to cancer, new drugs offer a lifeline to many patients whose condition would deteriorate without them. But according to a landmark study published in the Lancet — which analyzed 189 drug samples from Cameroon, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Malawi — up to a fifth failed quality tests. Many of the samples were generic drugs – those made more cheaply once the original manufacturer’s rights have expired, with 16 of the total 17 manufacturers being India-based. Using primary data from the research publication, an investigation from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) in partnership with The Hindu found that some of the drugs used to treat leukemia, ovarian, and breast cancer contained very little of the necessary key ingredients, while other drugs contained too much. In some cases, pills in the same blister pack contained different amounts of active ingredients. TBIJ analyzed the Lancet’s findings, finding that the worst performing drug identified in the study had been shipped to six countries with the largest importer being Ethiopia.

Clearing Landmines in Ukraine

Image: Screenshot, Bellingcat

Bellingcat collaborated with AFP to investigate the immense challenge of landmine contamination across Ukraine. Drawing on the National Mine Action Centre’s publicly available records, which is compiled from over 80 demining teams, the piece featured interactive maps that overlay confirmed, suspected, and cleared zones with farmland boundaries. Using Mapbox, Bellingcat’s maps allow readers to explore areas in eastern Ukraine where agriculture is the bread and butter of the region, but where stepping on unexploded ordnance remains a very real threat. Combined with on-the-ground interviews, Bellingcat contextualizes the human and economic toil of living and working in such areas.

Overcrowding in Italy’s Prisons

Image: Screenshot, Il Sole 24 Ore

Italy is known to have some of the highest prison overcrowding rates in Europe, with an incarcerated population average of nearly 135% of capacity, according to Associazione Antigone, an Italian NGO monitoring the country’s criminal justice system. Using data from Antigone’s latest report, Infodata mapped the extent of the crisis in the country, revealing that in six regions prisons are operating at close to 200% capacity, meaning they house double the number of inmates the facility was designed for. The interactive story offered readers a chance to explore individual penitentiaries, to see the number of inmates held in each location, and the overcrowding rate. The charts were created by data journalist David Ruffini, whose data analysis goes into more detail on his own live dashboard, with extra visualizations such as the number of inmates per officer and deaths in prisons.

Toxic Housing Legacy of LA Wildfires

Image: Screenshot, The New York Times

Six months have passed since devastating wildfires destroyed thousands of homes in LA. However, many of the properties that survived unscathed have been impacted by invisible toxins released by the smoke that seeped through vents and airways into the homes, according to this report in The New York Times. Reporters examined dozens of toxicology studies and interviewed homeowners through a survey to unveil the scale of the problem and review the role of insurance companies. Among the issues, some residents found evidence of benzene, emitted by rubber when it burns, and cyanide, which can be released by plasma TVs. Nearly all of the 122 reports conducted by 64 different insurance companies that the team reviewed showed some level of contamination. Using 3D modeling, the Times presented the differences between the testing done by insurance companies compared to investigators hired by families, where the latter revealed alarming levels of carcinogens.

Russia’s Alternative, Pro-Kremlin Encyclopedia

Image: Screenshot, Texty.org.ua

In 2022 Ruwiki — an imitation of the Russian-language version of Wikipedia — was set up in Russia, copying over 1.9 million articles from the original site. An analysis of these pages found that more than 33,000 articles were altered. According to this piece in the Ukrainian outlet Texty, edits were found to align with pro-Kremlin narratives, such as removing references to Russian war crimes, and altering terminology such as by replacing “war” with “combat operations.” The Texty report is based on a study by Oleksandr Kosovan from the Ukrainian Catholic University and Mykola Trokhymovych from Pompeu Fabra University, which also found that Ruwiki edits mostly occur during weekday office hours, unlike volunteer-driven Wikipedia, suggesting paid work. Texty charted the editing times, pulled out the key links that had been added or deleted, and compared fragments side by side to illustrate the changes.

Failure Rate of Middle East Ceasefires

Image: Screenshot, The Economist

It has been a complex year for conflict and ceasefires in the Middle East, where numerous cessations in hostilities have been declared, only to falter shortly after. On June 23, after the US joined Israel and began attacking Iran’s nuclear program, President Trump declared a “complete and total” ceasefire between Israel and Iran. The Economist analyzed data from the Ceasefire Project, a research group, covering over 2,200 declared ceasefires between 1989 and 2020. They found data to support the view that the Middle East does not have the best track record for ceasefires, with around half of them failing. Of the 77 entries of ceasefires involving Israel “none have brought lasting peace,” reporters noted.

Hanna Duggal is a data journalist at AJ Labs, the data, visual storytelling, and experiments team of Al Jazeera and a GIJN contributor. She has reported on issues such as policing, surveillance, and protests using data, and reported for GIJN on data journalism in the Middle East, investigating algorithms onTikTok, and on using data to investigate what tribal lands in the US.  

2025-07-10 15:00:37

The Reuters Institute recently released is annual deep dive into the state of global digital media, and its findings capture a landscape undergoing rapid shifts among the public’s news consumption habits, a lack of confidence in discerning between what it true and false, but a recognition of the the enduring appeal of independent, investigative journalism.

This year’s survey covered a record-high 48 markets across six continents and added news consumer insights from Serbia for the first time.

Increasingly, the Reuters Institute found, respondents were moving away from so-called traditional media platforms like print, TV, and websites, and instead seeking out social media and podcasts as their primary news sources. Within that trend is further growth toward consuming news-related content via video, and the burgeoning role of YouRube and TikTok “influencers,” who have become popular filters, aggregators, and commentators of the news. These online personalities rarely do original reporting, however, and are often dependent upon appropriating journalism published by well-established media brands, which might present some partnership opportunities for professional newsrooms.

But because of these influencers’ more informal, indirect, and unverified role presenting the news, they have prompted rising concern from the public about their reliability and veracity. In fact, despite their popularity, online influencers and personalities were also identified as among the top two biggest global threats for spreading false or misleading information (47%), equal to the perceived propaganda threat from national politicians (47%). News media and journalists were cited by a third of respondents (32%) as a major misinformation threat.

Overall, the perceived risk of sources spreading fake news or disinformation dovetails with a broader worry, expressed by a majority of the public (58%), that discerning between truth and lies online is growing ever more difficult.

Investigative journalism could play a key role in rebuilding that trust, the report found. The public expressed a desire to see more accountability reporting by the news media. “Respondents wanted journalists to spend their time investigating powerful people and providing depth rather than chasing algorithms for clicks,” the report noted.

And when it comes to verifying suspect claims or news stories, the public listed “a news source I trust” as its top, go-to source (38%), with fact-checking websites coming in fourth (25%). Notably, AI chatbots, with their demonstrated record of hallucinating made-up facts and sources, ranked last (9%) among respondents looking to double-check what is true.

One of the most encouraging trends for the future of watchdog reporting was the continued growth in podcasts, particularly among younger news consumers. In the US, for example, 15% of respondents had listened to a news-related podcast in the past week, among the highest rate globally. This weekly-use rate was comparable to a number of popular social media sites, like Instagram (19%), WhatsApp (19%), TikTok (16%), and X/Twitter (12%).

In addition, nearly three-quarters of listeners (73%) said podcasts “helped them understand issues more deeply than other types of media.” Podcast audiences were also more open to paying for high-quality, deeply reported information. As one 23-year-old respondent from the United Kingdom told the survey: “If a podcast offered unique investigative journalism, expert-led discussions, or deep analysis beyond standard news coverage, I might consider paying for it.”

For more detail on Reuters’ 2025 Digital News Report, you can read the overview and key findings, as well as dig into the individual country results.

2025-07-09 15:00:15

When Republika Srpska’s National Assembly passed its controversial “foreign agent” law earlier this year, it did not just target civil society, it drew a direct line under the independence of the media.

Framed as a measure of transparency, the law mirrors authoritarian models used to suppress dissent forcing media outlets that receive foreign funding to register, report, and operate under a cloud of suspicion. As journalists face surveillance, censorship, and the threat of closure, this law is widely seen as the “beginning of the end for press freedom” in Bosnia’s Serb entity.

This is not a local issue, it’s a template. The law is modelled on Russia’s notorious “foreign agent” legislation, which decimated independent journalism and crushed dissent over the past decade. Similar laws were adopted in Georgia and Turkey recently.

It forces media outlets receiving foreign funding to register, report extensively on their finances, and operate under constant scrutiny.

For the press in Republika Srpska — one of two states comprising the country of Bosnia and Herzegovina — the consequences are immediate. At least a dozen media outlets that receive international support for investigative journalism, fact-checking, or human rights coverage could face pressure and several journalists have reported increased monitoring, threats, and administrative pressure.

The implications go far beyond the borders of Bosnia and such a law raises urgent questions about Europe’s ability to uphold democratic values in its own neighborhood.

Modelled on Moscow

“I never thought this would happen here,” says Bosnian legal expert and activist Azra Berbic. “But now, we are all foreign agents in our own country.”

Their fear is well-founded. The law, passed in late February and now under the review of the Bosnian Constitutional Court, mandates that any organization or media outlet receiving foreign support and deemed to be engaged in “political activity” must submit exhaustive financial disclosures and visibly mark all its work as the product of a foreign agent. What qualifies as “political activity” is left intentionally vague, giving authorities sweeping discretion.

Almost immediately after the law’s adoption, police raided the offices of Capital.ba, a leading investigative outlet known for its critical reporting. For its editor-in-chief, Sinisa Vukelic, the message was unmistakable. “It’s not about transparency,” Vukelic told Gerila media. “It’s about control.”

Few observers doubt the origins of the law’s inspiration. The Russian Federation’s 2012 foreign agents law, first aimed at NGOs and later expanded to media outlets and individuals, has become an international symbol of authoritarian repression. Under that regime, Russian civil society has been gutted and independent journalism has nearly disappeared.

Republika Srpska’s President Milorad Dodik, facing his own political isolation after defying Bosnia’s state institutions and receiving a one-year prison sentence, appears eager to follow the same path. “We will establish the status of foreign agents for all those who receive money from foreign governments to undermine Republika Srpska,” Dodik told the media in January.

The Human Cost

Already, local NGOs are cancelling events and abandoning projects deemed too risky. Journalists are self-censoring. Sources are drying up.

Republika Srpska (pink) is one of two states that make up the Balkan country of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Image: Shutterstock

Elvir Padalovic from the independent outlet Buka described the effect in stark terms: “We all know what it means when someone is labeled a ‘foreign agent.’ It’s an attack on legitimacy, on public trust. When you combine that with criminal liability for defamation, you create an environment where people are afraid to say what they think or what they’ve discovered as facts, journalists working on serious topics now think twice before publishing something.”

“And that is a defeat for journalism and for freedom of speech,” Padalovic told The Fix.

Legal expert and activist Azra Berbic highlights how this law fits into a broader authoritarian trajectory. “Republika Srpska is becoming part of a broader oppressive culture leaning toward totalitarianism. Basic human rights are being restricted — freedom of association, expression, and action,” she said. “Self-censorship is already happening. Some are even thinking of leaving the sector altogether because they fear they won’t be able to carry this burden.”

A Global Pattern

Republika Srpska is not alone. Similar laws have surfaced in Georgia, Turkey, Kyrgyzstan, Slovakia, and El Salvador, as authoritarian regimes across the world adopt legal mechanisms designed to stifle independent voices under the guise of transparency.

In Bosnia, the law also comes alongside worrying new trends. In parallel with its adoption, Republika Srpska re-criminalized defamation, a move designed to chill investigative journalism even further. According to the official data, more than 35 journalists are already facing criminal charges that could result in prison time.

“It’s a deliberate strategy,” Berbic warns. “One step at a time, our leaders are pushing us closer to totalitarianism.”

The international response has been swift but so far toothless. The European Union, the Council of Europe, the OSCE, and various press freedom organizations have all condemned the law.

Yet statements alone will not reverse the damage. As the Justice Ministry begins implementing the law and inspections of media outlets and NGOs intensify, the space for resistance is shrinking.

“The EU and Council of Europe must go beyond words,” Borka Rudic, general secretary of the BH Journalists Association said in a press release on March 13. “They must link Bosnia’s accession path to concrete protections for media freedom. Without external pressure, this law will become the new normal – not only in Republika Srpska but potentially across the entire region.”

The Road Ahead

Can independent journalism survive under a legal framework that equates foreign funding with political subversion? That is now the existential question facing the media in Republika Srpska. For newsrooms already battered by limited resources, hostile authorities, and a shrinking advertising market, the additional stigma of being labeled a foreign agent may prove fatal.

While the Constitutional Court challenges are coming, and civil society is not giving up without a fight, the cost of this new law is already clear — in fear, in silence, and in the narrowing of a space that was never truly safe to begin with.

In the words of Padalovic: “The fear has crept in, and it’s palpable. Some may say they are not afraid, but realistically, every journalist, especially those working on serious topics, now thinks twice before publishing something. And that is a defeat for journalism and for freedom of speech.”

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by The Fix. It is republished here with permission. Learn about the latest from the world of European media by signing up for The Fix’s weekly newsletter.

Dusica Tomovic is an editor, trainer, and consultant based in Montenegro, and the former managing editor of Balkan Insight.

2025-07-08 15:00:23

Humans have a natural tendency to protect themselves from danger: pulling a hand away from a hot stove, avoiding dangerous places, or running from physical threats.

But we don’t have these instincts fully developed when it comes to the digital world.

“In the case of the internet, many times we’re doing things and we don’t have the slightest idea of the danger we’re facing out of pure ignorance,” Luis Assardo, a digital security trainer and investigative data journalist, told LatAm Journalism Review (LJR). “Especially in Latin America, we don’t have the necessary knowledge, so that skill or instinct hasn’t yet developed.”

Assardo will be the instructor for the new course, Digital Security for Journalists in Times of Crisis, offered by the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas and the Global Investigative Journalism Network (GIJN). The course will be free and held online from July 7 to August 3.

In a conversation with LJR, Assardo listed the most common mistakes he sees journalists make that they should avoid to maintain their digital security. Risks will always be present, he said, but it’s important to identify them to mitigate them.

1. Using Wi-Fi in Public Places

Luis Assardo, a digital security trainer and investigative data journalist, will be the instructor for a new course offered by the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas and GIJN. Image: GIJN

Latin America continues to see a digital divide. Some 28% percent of Latin Americans live in areas with low mobile broadband coverage, according to GSMA Intelligence. For this reason, Assardo said, journalists tend to take more risks and connect to public networks in restaurants, plazas, hotels, or airports.

Ideally, public networks should not be used, but if there is no other option, Assardo recommends using a VPN — a virtual private network that creates an encrypted connection between the device and a remote server, thereby masking the IP address and routing internet traffic through that server.

It’s also important to avoid online purchases while using an unknown Wi-Fi and, once internet use is complete, immediately delete the Wi-Fi connection from the device.

“Perhaps this is one of the biggest problems I find when I open any journalist’s Wi-Fi. I find hundreds of past Wi-Fi connections that are no longer useful,” Assardo said. “That way, anyone can know that you were at ‘Pepito’s’ restaurant and clone that Wi-Fi’s information.”

2. Not Protecting Data Privacy

In Latin American media, the use of WhatsApp is widespread, not only as a way for journalists to connect with audiences but also with sources.

WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption, so only the original sender and the final recipient can see the message. However, the privacy practices of WhatsApp and its parent company, Meta, are concerning, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Surveillance Self-Defense (SSD) guide.

Assardo explains that there is a difference between security and privacy. And while WhatsApp is secure, it is not necessarily private since it is possible to know who you talked to even without having access to the conversation.

“Meta, Google, Amazon, and all the large technology empires are data brokers. What they seek is to obtain data because that is basically what they trade with; it is part of their business model,” Assardo said. “We cannot fully trust them.”

According to Assardo, newsrooms should ideally use other more secure applications such as Signal, Threema, Session, or Wire.

3. Ignoring Device Updates

Software updates are essential for maintaining the security and performance of devices and applications. Updates provide protection against cyber threats, improve the user experience, and ensure compatibility with other software and hardware.

Not updating leaves an open window for vulnerabilities.

“I have met journalists who have had a device for two or three years and have never updated it,” Assardo said. “You can have a very secure password, but if you never updated the software, any attacker could access the device, take whatever they want, do whatever they want, leave, and you would never even know it.”

4. Not Backing Up Data

One of a reporter’s jobs is to go out to gather information or travel for a story. In this process, especially in countries where security or freedom of expression are at stake, a journalist’s devices can be compromised by theft or review by authorities.

Assardo said that backing up — creating a security copy — is an easy solution that allows journalists to navigate threats and reduce the impact of vulnerabilities.

“How long will it take me to do a backup? One hour, okay, I’ll leave it [backing up] and go to lunch,” Assardo said. “There are solutions. We can plan things in advance, even if we don’t have many resources.”

5. Falling for Attackers’ Distractions

Online harassment is a phenomenon used in a coordinated manner against journalists and can include confrontations and smear campaigns on social media.

Assardo said these types of attacks are not only used as a form of discrediting but also to distract the journalist from other problems that may be happening in tandem, such as legal harassment, surveillance, or financial harassment. Therefore, it is important to avoid acting or responding impulsively to attackers.

“Today, attacks on journalists occur not only with online harassment but also with legal harassment,” Assardo said. “They may be filing one or more lawsuits and need the journalist to be distracted, hooked with a troll, and not talking to their lawyer or with the defense they will need for their legal issues.”

6. Indiscriminately Downloading or Clicking

Microsoft says phishing is a way of tricking internet users into revealing personal or financial information through an email or a website. A common phishing scam begins with an email that looks like an official notice from a trusted source, such as a bank or credit card company. In the email, recipients are directed to a fraudulent website where they are asked for personal information, such as an account number or password. This information is usually used for identity theft.

Phishing can also be used with the intention of infecting a device with malicious software. A journalist who falls victim to phishing can lose confidential information about reports or sources.

Assardo said journalists should also be careful when using USB drives given by sources on their devices, as they could have hidden malicious codes.

“In a newsroom, there should be a computer that is not connected to the internet and is only for downloading information in these types of situations,” Assardo said.

7. Writing Down Passwords on Paper

Post-it notes are one of the most feared objects by digital security experts. Some people are accustomed to writing down their passwords on paper and leaving them accessible to anyone.

For Assardo, having a password written down on paper is a resounding no.

“In these workshops, I always ask attendees if they know the key they use to enter their house by heart, if they could draw it from memory,” Assardo said. “Everyone tells me they couldn’t even recognize it. That happens because it is part of a keychain. What the journalist needs is their keychain, a password manager that efficiently allows them to enter any door they need to enter.”

There are free and paid password manager options. Some options are LastPass, 1Password, or NordPass.

8. Storing Sensitive Information with Large Technology Companies

Assardo’s last recommendation is to try not to keep sensitive information on platforms owned by large technology companies, since, although they offer data encryption, there is a higher probability the data will be compromised.

“Suppose I am doing an investigation about gang members, and there is very sensitive information there from some sources. I would never put it on the drive,” Assardo said. “What I would do is use other tools like Cryptee or Tresorit, where I can have the information encrypted, and no one else will have access.”

Assardo concluded by saying digital literacy and security are not just for the few — but that knowledge can be adapted to the context, levels, and resources that are available.

This story was originally published by the LatAm Journalism review and is republished here with permission.

Katherine Pennacchio is a Venezuelan journalist with a master’s degree in Investigative, Data, and Visualization Journalism from Unidad Editorial and the Rey Juan Carlos University of Madrid. Pennacchio is passionate about data analysis and currently works as a freelancer.

2025-07-07 15:00:47

In recent years, investigative journalists have made a significant impact exposing labor and environmental abuses by the fossil fuel and palm oil industries. But noticeably less scrutiny has been given to extractive industries providing the resources for solar panels, electric car batteries, and other alternative fuel components.

Despite the climate benefits of renewable energy and the United Nations insistence that “human rights must be at the core of all mineral value chains,” each year, new resource extraction projects in the Global South exploit local communities or launch without their input, damaging local ecosystems and collectively displacing hundreds of thousands from their homes.

These harms range from less obvious risks, such as toxic waste tailings dams perilously located just upstream of villages inside earthquake zones, to more brazen — including the forced labor practices behind some solar cell components, the deforestation connection to new car models, and a loss of clean water access for Indigenous communities. In addition, end users of these affected supply chains typically have little to no visibility of the human costs and problematic origins of the green energy products they are enthusiastically embracing. Sometimes these distant consumers may even be the targets of savvy greenwashing campaigns, pushing misleading information about the extraction of critical raw materials such as bauxite, cobalt, rubber, and lithium.

According to the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, the accelerating demand for these resources is “pushing both producing and importing countries to prioritize access over safeguards, accelerating mining approvals and downplaying social, environmental, and human rights concerns.”

The good news is that investigative reporters can freely use several powerful investigative tools, originally designed for civil society groups, to hold various actors accountable for these harms — from Global South mining firms to the major Western brands they supply.

In a session on investigating the impact of alternative energy at the recent Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) conference in the US, a panel of experts revealed that a combination of direct reporting on affected communities plus deep supply chain research was the best formula for achieving impact. That’s not only because of the pressure that name-brand alternative energy manufacturers can exert on minerals suppliers and middlemen to limit the fallout of reckless extraction practices, but also because customers can spark public outrage over the faraway lives and ecosystems ruined to enable their green products.

The IRE panel included Annie Burns-Pieper, freelance investigative reporter and deputy research director at the human rights NGO Inclusive Development International (IDI), B. Toastie Oaster, an award-winning Indigenous affairs journalist at High Country News, and Sheridan Prasso, a senior writer for investigations at Bloomberg.

Prasso produced a classic supply chain investigation in this area in 2023, which traced much of the aluminium in a major US electric vehicle model to a refinery that has been blamed for sickening thousands of people in the Amazon, and to a mine linked to deforestation and land grabs. In March, she and her colleagues exposed serious labor rights violations at rubber and palm oil plantations in West Africa, including allegations that women working there routinely face demands for sex in exchange for employment. She showed how these plantations ultimately supply major Western tire and food brands.

Bloomberg investigated the links between famous Western brands and labor abuses at West African rubber plantations. Image: Screenshot, Bloomberg

Prasso said major brands at the consumer-facing end of supply chains typically rebuff these kinds of investigations by simply saying: “We follow the law.” But she urged journalists not to be dissuaded by mere proof of regulatory compliance.

“Following the law is not the same as being unaccountable for harm at the other end of supply chains,” she explained, adding that many corporations also have social and environmental policies that might conflict with supplier behavior.

Using Civil Society Resources for Supply Chain Investigations

The nonprofit group IDI works directly with grassroots organizations and global communities affected by the extractives industry to help defend their rights. And Burns-Pieper confirmed that the group is glad to connect journalists to these hard-to-reach sources in often remote parts of the world, offering a reporting channel that could potentially provide a bounty of contacts and story ideas.

“I feel that supply chain stories connected to the energy transition are under-covered,” said Burns-Pieper. “People are a little intimidated by this area, but there are some great tools that can really get you going. We at IDI have investigated more than 300 harmful projects since 2016 — largely mining-related — and we work with groups all over the world, and we’ve been training people in civil society to do this research themselves, so we can put reporters in touch with communities abused at the end of these chains.”

Prasso vouched for the intrinsic value of this global networking, adding: “I can’t do my work without the connections provided by groups like IDI.”

“Most of this research is done using publicly available free sources, and just takes knowing where to look,” Burns-Pieper explained. “Try to step back and look at how this mineral usually gets to market, not specific to your project, but generally. Google the commodity and the word ‘supply chain’ and look at the images, and you can often see the basic steps the mineral takes; that’s useful for finding the types of actors involved.”

She added: “This work requires creative investigative research. I start with advanced Googling — seeing if I can connect the mining company with the major end-users — and then there are other ways, such as company disclosures, media reports, expert databases, OSINT tools, Google Pinpoint, and Google Images.”

Burns-Pieper also shared a comprehensive list of civil society research tools that investigative reporters can freely access (but rarely take advantage of):

• Follow The Money Toolkit. This vast treasure trove of free tools and databases from IDI lets reporters dig into every aspect of corporate harm in the Global South, and features open source research tools, corporate registries, and even pension fund disclosures. Databases range from Land Matrix — a dataset of global land deals — to the Chinese Loans to Africa Database as well as the GIJN Resource Center.

Snapshot of the resources listed in the Inclusive Development International’s Follow the Money Toolkit. Image: Screenshot

• BankTrack. This tool offers several resources that profile the financial institutions funding potentially harmful corporate projects in vulnerable places, particularly in the Global South. Run by a civil society advocacy nonprofit in the Netherlands, the platform includes a ‘Dodgy Deals Database’ that is described as a “one-stop information source” on the financing of projects deemed to be harmful to society or the environment by civil society partners. Caution: Most of the scores of case profiles are contributed by civil society campaigners, and BankTrack freely concedes that the database is not comprehensive, and that facts on the deals and projects need to be independently verified. However, Burns-Pieper said the tool can be an excellent source of leads for journalists to check, follow, and develop.
• Business and Human Rights Resource Centre Company Index. This resource allows reporters and researchers to search the track records of more than 20,000 companies on social and environmental issues, based on reported news and allegations of harm. It also includes a new company dashboard that offers additional financial and policy data on 142 extractive industry firms and 144 tech companies.
• Just Transition Litigation Tracking Tool. Also hosted by the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, this is a database of community or civil society lawsuits against companies undertaking key mining or renewable energy-related extraction projects, or against states authorizing them. “It’s useful that they’re tracking litigation on this issue, and it’s a resource for journalists to find contacts,” said Burns-Pieper.
• Environmental Justice Atlas. EJAtlas documents socio-environmental conflicts involving harmful economic activities across the globe, recording more than 4,300 conflicts to date. It allows users to filter for commodities, and to zoom into specific regions.
• FollowingTheMoney.org. This is a major resource from IDI that includes the Development Bank Investment Tracker, which includes records for almost 300,000 project investments by 17 development finance institutions, the Shareholder Tracker, and a PalmWatch tool, which maps global palm oil supply chains and the major Western brands they supply. It also features original harm investigations, and a practical guide to supply chain research. “It’s a research guide developed for civil society, but it works just as well for reporters,” Burns-Pieper added.

Connecting Brands with Global South Harms

“Regarding AI, I have not had any luck using LLMs for supply chain research, though this is probably coming,” said Burns-Pieper. “But I find Pinpoint really helpful. I will do a batch download or scrape of corporate documentation — from a company website or SEC filings — then I’ll dump that all into Pinpoint, and that will pick out the names of organizations in those documents, and you can see if there are any big brands named, or any middlemen involved.”

Annie Burns-Pieper is a freelance investigative reporter and IDI’s deputy research director. Image: Screenshot, LinkedIn

She added: “Pinpoint also now has the Gemini feature, where you can ask it questions about what’s in your documents. I asked Gemini ‘What car companies are mentioned in this documentation?’ and it pulled out all the car firms.” Once verified, this information could offer a reporter numerous story angles.

Other green energy investigations worth pursuing include tracing the provenance of components from certain companies in China and other authoritarian nations that are banned from Western markets due to allegations of forced labor. Despite the restrictions, these raw materials can still find their way into those markets — and even into public utilities — via middlemen, or in the form of finished products manufactured in other countries.

“The idea is to find the connective tissue, and a lot of what I do involves import-export records to link supply chains to particular companies,” Prasso explained. Key tools that Prasso uses include:

• ImportGenius – a searchable subscription-based service with detailed US import-export records, that offers data from other countries for an additional charge.
• 52wmb.com – a more affordable database that includes data on product types, quantities, and prices from 32 countries.
• Sayari – a subscription-based supply chain research tool that shows connections between companies, and sometimes provides journalists with additional data in exchange for citation, according to Prasso.
• ImportYeti – a less comprehensive but entirely free database that allows researchers to find suppliers via a database of 70 million US sea shipment records.

“I also find knowing the major end-users of something is really helpful; in knowing that a collection of major car manufacturers are responsible for using a particular mineral — that’s going to help your supply chain work,” said Burns-Pieper.

“This is not an exact science,” she acknowledged. “It’s going to be hard to find all of the exact customers connected to a particular project or company. There are few disclosure requirements for these things; these agreements are often protected by commercial secrecy rules and there will be gaps in information. A realistic goal is to gather enough credible evidence to question the companies involved.”

Rowan Philp is GIJN’s global reporter and impact editor for GIJN. Rowan was formerly chief reporter for South Africa’s Sunday Times. As a foreign correspondent, he has reported on news, politics, corruption, and conflict from more than two dozen countries around the world.

2025-07-05 05:25:40

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