![]() The strategy has immediate and dangerous ramifications, she said, as many countries, including the Philippines and the U.S., are scheduled to hold elections in 2022. tech companies, she told Latanya Sweeney, Daniel Paul Professor of the Practice of Government and Technology at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS). “And these types of tactics on social media really do work.”ĭuterte’s elaborate network of fake and real Facebook accounts in the Philippines working in coordination to flood enough disinformation and lies to drown out facts and truth and change people’s views and behavior, should serve as a “cautionary tale” for other countries and prompt calls for immediate interventions that must be led by the U.S. All of this is meant to intimidate me, to silence me, or to be afraid and duck out,” she said. “I am putting myself in their power because I will do my job. 10, Ressa still doesn’t know whether the Duterte government will allow her to attend. ![]() Invited to receive her Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in Oslo, Norway, on Dec. ![]() Facing years in prison, she’s appealing the conviction and says the charges are merely an attempt to weaken Rappler and serve as a warning to other journalists. Ressa neither wrote nor edited the piece, which was published in 2012, before the libel law existed. Ressa has been sued and arrested multiple times, and Manila court convicted her of cyber libel in June 2020 over a story about a wealthy businessman’s ties to a judge and to the drug world. Since 2016, Ressa and her Rappler colleagues have been targeted online for their criticism and exposés of Duterte. She was a reporter and bureau chief at CNN for two decades before co-founding Rappler, an independent investigative news outlet, in the Philippines, in 2012. ![]() This is the world we live in,” said Ressa, winner of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, referencing a notion from Yale historian Timothy Snyder’s book “On Tyranny.”Ĭurrently a Shorenstein Center Fellow and Hauser Leader at the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School, Ressa has spent her 35 years in journalism covering Southeast Asia. “When you want to rip the heart out of a democracy, you go after the facts. You get what’s been happening in the Philippines over the past five years, as President Rodrigo Duterte’s government has turned social media into an effective tool of information warfare designed to intimidate and silence all opposition and distort and manipulate the public’s understanding of reality, warned investigative journalist Maria Ressa during the annual Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press on Tuesday evening. Omidyar's holdings were subsequently donated to Rappler employees, but the SEC ruled that that move had no effect on its earlier decision.What happens when an authoritarian leader waging a campaign of extrajudicial killings and disappearances in his antidrug war uses the internet to spread misinformation and set public opinion against all critics of his methods, including journalists? Philippine laws prohibit foreign control of mass media. That in itself would not have been necessarily illegal, but the SEC noted "a provision requiring the Filipino stockholders of Rappler to seek the approval of Omidyar Network on fundamental corporate matters." The company had received funding from the Omidyar Network, a philanthropic investment firm owned by e-Bay founder Pierre Omidyar. The SEC maintained that the news outlet had violated foreign ownership rules after a court-mandated review. Last week, the Philippines' Securities and Exchange Commission released an order affirming its decision in 2018 to revoke the articles of incorporation of Rappler. Rappler said Ressa and Santos would elevate their challenges against the conviction to the country's Supreme Court - an opportunity, they said, "to take a second look at the constitutionality of cyber libel and the continuing criminalization of libel, especially in light of the freedom of expression and freedom of the press."
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