The fight against fake news, Trojan horse of the repression of press freedoms
Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2025 8:58 am
The government has given itself legal means to prohibit the publication of any information that it believes could generate unrest. Many countries are affected by this scheme, such as El Salvador, Thailand, Armenia, etc., where curfews and tracking systems have been temporarily put in place. In Japan , an emergency law (lifted on May 25) placed the public broadcaster NHK on the list of institutions to which the government is authorized to give "instructions," while in Ukraine , the public television channel PBC was deprived of a quarter of its budget.
Governments are also limiting access to news sources, reducing travel and restricting accreditation. In Hungary, for example, “ the government has banned public hospitals and doctors from making statements to journalists. Only press officers from ministries or the government’s coronavirus task force can answer questions,”
Explains Veronika Munk, deputy editor-in-chief of Index.hu , a widely read independent media outlet in the country (comments reported in an article from larevuedesmedias.ina.fr, dated 27 May 2020). On 25 March 2020, RSF and eight other freedom organisations had called on Europe to challenge the measures proposed by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in an open letter . In Greece , a Health Ministry decision issued on April 13, 2020, banned hospital staff from making statements to the media , and subjected bank data all reporting by Greek journalists in hospitals to prior government review.
In the spring of 2020, a report from the US State Department published by the Washington Post reported 2 million tweets relating to the virus, 7% of which spread conspiracy theories about Covid-19. The spread of false information does not date from the pandemic, but the phenomenon has increased during the crisis, with the WHO even going so far as to speak of an " infodemic ", an overabundance of information, some of which can be misleading or even harmful. Pauline Adès-Mevel points out: " Chinese storytelling is a story that has nothing to do with what happened. When we rewind, there is the Chinese discourse... and then the events since October and the arrival of the disease in this territory."
Governments are also limiting access to news sources, reducing travel and restricting accreditation. In Hungary, for example, “ the government has banned public hospitals and doctors from making statements to journalists. Only press officers from ministries or the government’s coronavirus task force can answer questions,”
Explains Veronika Munk, deputy editor-in-chief of Index.hu , a widely read independent media outlet in the country (comments reported in an article from larevuedesmedias.ina.fr, dated 27 May 2020). On 25 March 2020, RSF and eight other freedom organisations had called on Europe to challenge the measures proposed by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in an open letter . In Greece , a Health Ministry decision issued on April 13, 2020, banned hospital staff from making statements to the media , and subjected bank data all reporting by Greek journalists in hospitals to prior government review.
In the spring of 2020, a report from the US State Department published by the Washington Post reported 2 million tweets relating to the virus, 7% of which spread conspiracy theories about Covid-19. The spread of false information does not date from the pandemic, but the phenomenon has increased during the crisis, with the WHO even going so far as to speak of an " infodemic ", an overabundance of information, some of which can be misleading or even harmful. Pauline Adès-Mevel points out: " Chinese storytelling is a story that has nothing to do with what happened. When we rewind, there is the Chinese discourse... and then the events since October and the arrival of the disease in this territory."