Philippines journalist leading war on
fake news may be jailed for 12 years on libel charges
“The toughest part is not knowing whether it’s going to be a normal day, or a not normal day,” says Maria Ressa, speaking by phone from her office in Manila. A former
CNN bureau chief who spent two decades as an investigative reporter, Ressa is the founder of a news website that has found itself on the frontline of the global disinformation wars.
Since the summer of 2016, her reporters at Rappler have been engaged in a running battle with paid trolls, influencers, bot armies and fake news websites run by supporters of Rodrigo Duterte, the authoritarian president of the Philippines.