Ladder
Ladder: official labels, in Asia
A government officially brands a news outlet or a journalist as a source of disinformation or "fake news", or requires it to register as an agent of another country. Such labels often carry reporting duties and restrictions, and can cost the outlet its audience and advertisers.
The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct.
Narrow this ladder
2Pressure
Using state power short of prosecution to change coverage: regulatory threats, licence reviews, funding cuts, lawsuits by officials, official "fake news" or "foreign agent" labels, advertising pressure, tax audits.
Vietnam's Decree 72 took effect in September 2013, barring bloggers and social media users from linking to or reposting news from press organizations or foreign government websites, restricting them to sharing personal information only.
Note: Vietnam's decree barred bloggers from sharing news articles at all, restricting them to personal content on pain of prosecution; no United States rule confines an outlet or blogger to personal content.
Sustained 1 September 2013 · 3 sources · Full entry
India's 2023 amendment to its Information Technology Rules empowered a government-run Fact Check Unit to label online content about the central government 'fake' or 'false' and require its removal; comedian Kunal Kamra and media groups challenged it, and the Bombay High Court struck the rule down a…
Reversed 20 September 2024 · 2 sources · Full entry
Georgia's parliament passed a law requiring media and civil-society groups that receive 20 percent or more of their funding from abroad to register as organizations "serving the interests of a foreign power," over mass street protests and international criticism that the label would be used to marg…
Sustained · 1 source · Full entry
3Punish
Legal or physical action against individual journalists or sources: subpoenas and record seizures, prosecutions, arrests, detention, expulsions, visa denials, assault where a government actor is involved.
Pakistan's parliament amended the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act to create a new Social Media Protection and Regulatory Authority with power to block online content and a Social Media Protection Tribunal, and made spreading information deemed 'fake or false' punishable by up to three years in…
Sustained · 2 sources · Full entry
All ladders · Official labels: by country and year · The United States chapter