In a new feature published this week, Committee to Protect Journalist’s (CPJ) Consultant Technology Editor Madeline Earp explains how forensic tools open a new front for using phone data to prosecute journalists.
A law enforcement agent scrolling through a journalist’s unlocked phone is already a problematic scenario for press freedom. This risk is supercharged by technology that can copy and search the entire content of phones and computers, even if they are locked.
Forensic tools can access everything on a phone or computer and are in widespread, open usage in democracies and more repressive regimes. Their use has accelerated threats to the press while protections and public awareness lag.
It has become routine for authorities to take phones and computers into custody when investigating a journalist. CPJ’s prison census, a snapshot of journalists in prison on December 1, 2022, lists examples from Iran, Belarus, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Vietnam and India.
The United States and Australia are two more countries—of many—where these tools are becoming ubiquitous. In October, CPJ wrote about the legal battle to protect slain Las Vegas reporter Jeff German’s electronic devices; forensic tools were used to convict journalists in Myanmar and search for their sources in Nigeria.
