The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joined its Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) partners and the SafeJournalists Network (SJN), in expressing serious concern over the revelations in Amnesty International’s forensic analysis, exposing the invasive use of spyware and other digital tools by Serbian intelligence services and police to hack journalists’ phones as part of a covert surveillance campaign. These concerning revelations come amidst escalating threats against journalists in Serbia. In the report “A Digital Prison”: Surveillance and the Suppression of Civil Society in Serbia” published on 16 December 2024, Amnesty International revealed that mobile forensic products made by the Israeli…

On 10 December 2024, the judge of Minsk City Court, sentenced journalist Volha Radzivonava to four years of imprisonment for criminal defamation. The IFJ and EFJ support their affiliate, the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) in condemning this blatant attack on free speech, as “another effort to silence independent journalism and restrict critical voices in Belarus.” Volha Radzivonava worked for KYKY.org news portal and freelanced for other news outlets. She was arrested on 7 March 2024 for allegedly “discrediting the Republic of Belarus”, “incitement to racial, national, religious, or other social hostility or discord” and “defaming” and “insulting the President…

Less than a week after the publication of our joint appeal to the EU to take urgent EU-wide measures, such as stricter regulation of spyware exports and use, new spyware abuse scandal erupts in Serbia: Serbian intelligence services and police have used spyware and other digital tools to hack the phones of journalists and illegally surveil them, Amnesty International said in a report published on Monday. According to this very documented report, mobile forensic products made by Israeli firm Cellebrite are being used by authorities in Serbia to extract data from journalists and activists’ phones, while new Serbian spyware “NoviSpy”…

The Danish Union of Journalists (DJ) website is no longer visible from Google’s search results for 1% of Danish users as part of a “time-limited test” by Google. The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) urges Google to reconsider this “experiment” and restores the visibility of DJ’s and Danish news websites in its search results. The experiment was announced on 14 November and consists of hiding traditional news websites from 1% of users in 8 countries: Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Denmark, Greece, Croatia, Poland and Spain. While a French court ruled the experiment illegal after a complaint from the French…

On 10 December 2024, more than 90 participants discussed via Zoom the development of cooperation between self-regulation and co-regulation bodies in Ukraine, as well as media self-regulation practices in Belgium’s French- and German-speaking regions. They also heard from members of working groups focused on joint responses in the audiovisual, audio, online, and print media sectors. The event brought together representatives from the National Council of Ukraine on Television and Radio Broadcasting, the European Federation of Journalists, and journalists from Ukraine and Europe. The conference featured opening remarks by Ricardo Gutiérrez, Secretary General of the European Federation of Journalists, and Olena Nitsko,…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) stands in solidarity with the workers of Galicia’s public radio and television (CRTVG), who have been on indefinite strike since 7 October against the dismantling of the public service and attempts to punish and coerce workers who exercise their free right to strike. Today, the strike is temporarily suspended after more than thirty days, which has paralysed the broadcasting of the outsourced magazine ‘O Termómetro’, replacing the old programme ‘A Revista’, on the air for almost thirty years. The last programme of the 65 initially contracted will be broadcast, and the strike committee is…