The EU is increasingly dedicating resources and funding to developing technologies aimed at tracking migration flows, using biometric and other sensitive data, and monitoring borders with dystopian automated systems. These systems often target vulnerable groups, such as migrants, who are surveilled and exploited as data subjects without their consent.
While desk research provides a broad overview of funding flows, only firsthand investigations along the Mediterranean and Atlantic borders have enabled us to fully grasp how migration control is being transformed by surveillance and automation. On-the-ground journalistic investigations in Greece, Spain and Italy have revealed that such investments are frequently squandered on automated systems that either fail to function properly or are poorly implemented, resulting in millions of euros wasted. Instead of safeguarding migrants' lives, these technologies often place them at greater risk.
Join this session to learn how to conduct fieldwork research and gather primary-source information on the intersection of migration and technology. Little technical background is required to report on this issue, as its societal impact is immense. We will share our findings and demonstrate how to assess this critical topic avoiding EU hype reflected in money flows, public tenders, pressnotes, etc. while contrasting it with on the ground information.
The Church is one of the most important players in the European property market, yet it remains to be an opaque institution hard to investigate. Our collaborative project Sacred Grounds is the first one that brings a comprehensive picture on valuable assets the Church owns across European cities and its investment strategies impacting the shape of our cities For six months, we have cooperated across European media outlets to find out: Do the Churches manage their land holdings in the spirit of Christianity, in the service of the common good and in accordance with their own ethical codes? And what is the impact of church property dealings on the affordability of housing or public services? The coordinators of the Urban Journalism Network investigation will showcase major international and local findings, explain how to get data and how to investigate the non-transparent institution as the Church is.
How do oil, gas, and coal giants manipulate climate narratives to protect their profits? How does climate disinformation shape government policies and delay urgent climate action? In this hands-on workshop, investigative journalist Liubov Velychko will share the methodologies and tools used to track and expose disinformation campaigns financed by major polluters, such as Shell, ExxonMobil, Saudi Aramco, Gazprom, and Coal India Ltd. In this session, you will learn to map the disinformation system, to track connections between fossil fuel corporations, disinformation agents, and policymakers; how to Where to find key data sources on corporate lobbying, campaign funding, and PR influence. analyze financial flows behind disinformation campaign, track disinformation influencers and identify key figures spreading climate disinformation Practical techniques for uncovering covert industry-funded research that distorts climate science.
You will leave the session with a toolkit of investigative methods for tracking climate disinformation, a list of reliable databases and sources for following money and influence., hands-on techniques for fact-checking corporate claims and policy manipulation and a clearer understanding of how climate disinformation impacts global climate action.
Come ready to dive deep into the mechanics of disinformation and learn how to expose those who profit from climate denial. No prior experience required—just bring your curiosity and investigative mindset!
OpenSanctions is a global database of sanctioned companies and people, entities that have faced criminal or regulatory action, civil society watchlists, and an archive of global political office-holders. We'd like to help reporters to integrate the resource into their journalistic toolkit: what information can be found? How should I interpret the results? How can the database be used in investigations? How can you use our underlying open source technology for more advanced investigative graph building?
If you have not yet tried investigating in this part of the world, we will be looking at why it’s worth investigating property owners in Dubai, and how to do it. We will share tools and tricks we used in the Dubai Unlocked collaboration, and also discuss ways of identifying leads and developing a solid story about how the Emirates are used as a safe haven for criminals.
In cities all over Europe, buildings today are treated as investments rather than the increasingly rare spaces for people to live in. Every year, tens of thousands of former family homes, industrial and office spaces are being vacated and demolished – most of them in order for real estate speculators to build expensive replacements for buildings that could have less costly been renovated. With the help of the crowd, investigative media house CORRECTIV has launched the demolition atlas where people share information about planned demolitions and possible speculations, so far in Switzerland, Germany and Greece with partner media Solomon. In this session, we will show you how we reached thousands to participate, what kind of stories came out of it and how you can do the same in your country – no expert skills required.
In this session, we'll explore the methodology behind Newtral's data-driven investigation of flood-prone buildings and areas in Spain, which allowed the data team to find that at least 200,000 buildings in the country are vulnerable to flooding. The investigation didn't only reply on traditional soil or urbanistic studies to identify flood-prone areas, but also used the information from Spain's National Cadastral to gather the data, city by city and street by street, of all the buildings constructed in vulnerable or hazardous zones. We will share the model that can be replicable and/or scalable to other European countries, particularly those in the Mediterranean region. Through this session, attendees will learn how to source, process, and visualize cartographic data of urban typology to identify threatened areas. This session is suitable for beginners. Attendees should Python installed, along with a code editor like Visual Studio Code. No coding knowledge is necessary - the code will be shared with you, and you can just follow along. If you use Windows, please install Ubuntu (on Mac, this is not necessary).
