European Federation of Journalists: Online Attacks on Journalists in Europe Spreading, Balkans Among the Hardest Hit

EFJ

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) released on Nov. 28 a report called, “Ending the Silence on Online Harassment of Journalists,” which shows that online threats, smear campaigns, and digital violence against journalists have become one of the major challenges to the freedom of the media in Europe, especially in the Western Balkans.

The study, which covers all of the states in which the EFJ operates, is based on a survey conducted among trade unions, as well as on interviews and workshops held earlier this year. According to its findings, more than 60 percent of journalists’ organizations reported an increase in digital attacks, while 40 percent were confronted with such attacks being normalized, as if they were just another common professional hazard, with women and minority groups being the most frequent targets.

The report highlights that the cases recorded in Serbia, including a yearslong campaign against journalists Dinko Gruhonjic and Ana Lalic Hegedis, “reflect a much broader pattern of coordinated attacks” that often spill over from the digital sphere into the private lives of journalists. The organization warned that 41 percent of targeted Serbian journalists had experienced some form of online impersonation or identity theft including deepfake content.

The program director of the Independent Journalists’ Association of Vojvodina (NDNV), BETA journalist and university professor Dinko Gruhonjic, said that such attacks were rarely confined to the internet. “A single fake video triggered an avalanche of threats against me and my family. I never thought that loyalty to professional principles, truth and justice would make me fear for my own life in my own country. Yet, staying silent is not an option,” Gruhonjic said.