June-July 2023: Whistleblower-journalist relationships, IRE, new legal staff
Reflections on the late Daniel Ellsberg and whistleblower-journalist relationships
The late Daniel Ellsberg, who died last month, is one of the best known and most influential whistleblowers in contemporary history.
Our team reflected on how his story of the Pentagon Papers is a reminder of the persistent challenges that whistleblowers can encounter when working with journalists.
TSN hosts IRE panel with Knight Foundation
The Signals Network held its first panel at the Investigative Reporters and Editors Conference (IRE) in Orlando, Florida.
Twitter whistleblower Anika Collier Navaroli, Uber Files whistleblower Mark MacGann and health insurance industry whistleblower Wendell Potter spoke about their whistleblowing journeys and offered tips to journalists on how to best work with whistleblower sources.
Kathy Kiely (TSN Board of Directors) moderated the Knight Foundation-sponsored panel, which was titled “How to Help Whistleblowers Help You.”
And in case you missed it, TSN and whistleblowers we support were also at RightsCon earlier in the month. A refresher:
- TSN’s Delphine Halgand-Mishra moderated a panel on whistleblower protections in U.S., U.K., Ireland.
TSN-supported Facebook content moderation whistleblower Daniel Motaung spoke on a panel entitled “Facebook: deadly by design.”
TSN-supported Twitter whistleblower Anika Collier Navaroli spoke with journalist Melissa Chan on diversity, tech and the whistleblowing experience.
Growing TSN’s legal operations
Thanks to your support, our legal department is growing to meet increasing needs for whistleblowers!
Meet our new staff attorney, Nolberto Zubía, who joined us in June. Also meet our legal fellow, Mia Marzotto, who joined us in April.
You can learn more about our team here.
Whistleblower news roundup
- The Washington Post’s Drew Harwell reveals new details about Twitter’s role in Jan. 6th. This June 23 story reports a video from inside Twitter in which TSN-supported whistleblower Anika Navaroli says: “For months we have been allowing folks to maintain and say on the platform that they’re locked and loaded, that they are ready to shoot people, that they’re ready to commit violence.” The Washington Post says the video is just one of dozens of documents that were shared with the January 6th Committee investigating the attack on the Capitol, but which have never been released.
- From ICIJ: A Dutch court has found that Isabel dos Santos, the daughter of the former President of Angola, illegally diverted millions of dollars from her businesses. The ruling, which found director “mismanagement” enabled Ms. dos Santos, echoes findings by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists’s Luanda Leaks investigation. TSN provided support to Rui Pinto, the individual who disclosed the material behind the Luanda Leaks.
- From TechCrunch: A whistleblower was fired in 2018 after presenting a “scathing quality control report” on the OceanGate submersible that went missing last month during an expedition to the Titanic wreckage.
