World Press Freedom Day highlights the vital role of journalism in protecting democratic values and fostering informed societies.
Since its inception in 1993, it has served as platform to celebrate the principles of press freedom, reflect on the challenges faced by journalists worldwide, advocate for independence and safety of media professionals and honour journalists who have lost their lives in pursuit of truth.
The theme for this year Would Press Freedom Day is “Reporting in the Brave New World: The Impact of Artificial intelligence on Press Freedom and the Media.” Al is transforming journalism, providing tools that enhance investigative reporting, content creation and fact checking. It allows for greater efficiency, multi -lingual accessibility and improved data analysis.
However, these advancements also bring risks such as generating misinformation and disinformation, deep fake technology, biased content moderation and surveillance threats to journalists.
Al’s role in the media business model raises concern about fair remuneration for journalistic content and media viability It is imperative for stakeholders to ensure that Artificial intelligence (Al) strengthenS rather than undermine press freedom and democratic values, hence, the need for all stakeholders, including journalists, policy makers, media professionals and civil society actors to come together to explore these complex issues on a day like this.
While the principles of free, independent and pluralistic media remain crucial, Al’s impact on information gathering, processing and dissemination is profound, presenting both innovative opportunities and challenges.
Al offers potential to enhance freedom of expression by democratizing access to information, empowering global communications and changing the reality of the flow of information around the world.
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This year’s World Press Freedom Day aims to explore Al’s impact on press freedom and the right to freedom of expression as well as addressing the continued relevance of information as a public good.
Al is transforming the fundamental right to seek, impart and receive information, as well as the journalism. It enhanced access to information and processing it thereby enabling journalists to handle and process vast amount of data efficiently and create content more effectively.
Al tools can improve fact checking, data visualization, local and multiplatform adaptation of news content and its translation, streamlining the journalistic process and making information more engaging and accessible.
Al also presents risks! It can be used to reproduce misinformation, spread disinformation, amplify hate speech, especially online and enable new forces of censorship.
Al provides both opportunities and challenges for women journalists. Al can support victims of gender based violence by streamlining reporting tools and enhancing fairness in digital spaces.
These advancements could reduce barriers to reporting abuse and enable faster responses. Al also amplifies existing risks for women journalists in the digital landscape. Al offers media outlet tools to increase efficiency through task automation, helping newsroom meet growing demands and remain competitive.
However, the financial sustainability of media is becoming more fragile as generative Al platforms repurposes journalistic content without proper compensation, diverting revenue from independent outlets to digital platforms and to Al actors.
On election and democratic processes, Al is increasingly influencing the integrity of elections, offering tools for fast checking and combatting disinformation while empowering Journalists and voters to promote informed democratic participation.
However, it poses risks as generative Al enables the creation of misleading content like deep fakes, undermining trust in democratic institutions.
Addressing these challenges requires collaboration among governments, media and civil society.
The objectives of World Press Freedom Day,2025 is to examine Artificial Intelligence’s impact on press freedom, exploring how it affects the free flow of information, media freedom and the achievement of SDG 16.10 ‘to ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms. Consequently, the discussion on the 2025 theme will:
(I) Reaffirm the universal commitment to freedom of expression and press freedom.
(ii) Explore Al’s effects on media pluralism, diversity and independence.
(iii)Assess Al’s impact on news and media content creation and dissemination.
(iv) Encourage media to make ethical use of Al systems in their operations.
(v) Strengthen collaboration between media stakeholders.
(vi) Support enabling environment for media to have the rights and resources to effectively report on the benefits and harms of Al system.
(vii) Encourage global cooperation for journalists’ safety.
(viii) Support media integration of Al focusing on viability and representation.
(ix) Emphasize the importance of information integrity on Al impacts.
(x) Promote media and information literacy skills to strengthen critical thinking and competencies needed to understand the use and implications of Al system.
Gbemiga Bamidele, Ph.D is the Convener, Society for Journalism Enhancement Initiatives (S4JE1).