Investigative projects are often likened to marathons. But, every now and then, watchdog reporters need to sprint. In a recent IRE23 conference session, experts shared tips on how to unearth background facts about little-known people on short notice.
Despite its overt political objectives, the research section of FBK — an anti-corruption nonprofit founded by Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny — has emerged as a potent investigative team that recently attracted 110 million YouTube views for a video that exposed massive corruption at a Black Sea palace. FBK’s head of investigations told GIJN about the methods the team uses for these investigations, and what professional journalists can learn from their approach.
Investigative journalists can discover story leads from scrutinizing financial or asset disclosures. Data journalist Paul Bradshaw shares nine ways to find stories in companies’ accounts, including looking out for conflicts of interest, and mapping connections between companies and directors.
Taboom Media has created a reporting guide for journalists interested in investigating how US-based faith groups and NGOs foment hate against LGBTQI+ communities, both in the United States and abroad.
What’s the global data journalism community tweeting about this week? Our NodeXL #ddj mapping from June 3 to 9 finds @sto3psl mapping places the Avengers visited in Europe, @fedfragapane visualizing which elements in the periodic table are in danger of running out, @srfdata highlighting the top worries of the Swiss and @propublica doing researchers and journalists a huge public service by making 3 million US nonprofit records text-searchable.
The German nonprofit news site Correctiv wanted to cover important issues — such as property ownership in German cities — that didn’t have accessible public data. So it created CrowdNewsroom, a platform that enables it to empower readers to contribute to investigations.
Public records sometimes say the darnedest things. One example: A declassified memo from 1977 shows that the NSA wondered if psychics could nuke cities so that they became lost in time and space (yes, like in the post-apocalyptic anime Akira). Other times, it’s what they don’t say — like when the FBI found it necessary to redact the name of Superman’s alter-ego, Clark Kent.
Property records hold a wealth of information. Uncovering who owns land can be critical for reporting on stories ranging from political corruption and environmental crimes to deceitful treatment of indigenous peoples. GIJN has compiled an extensive resource page on property records.
The Global Investigative Journalism Network is pleased to announce that it is now offering its members an exclusive arrangement with leading global data and analytics company LexisNexis. GIJN members will now have access to one of the world’s largest electronic databases for legal and public records-related information, and for news and business information.
We love indictments, and here’s one that caught our eye at GIJN: a recently unsealed document from the US Department of Justice last month, alleging that Venezuelan television mogul Raul Gorrin Belisario was part of a billion-dollar currency exchange and money laundering scheme that paid off high-level Venezuelan government officials. Belisario is no ordinary exile…
