{"id":11150,"date":"2025-04-14T00:55:10","date_gmt":"2025-04-13T23:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/?p=11150"},"modified":"2025-04-12T12:15:55","modified_gmt":"2025-04-12T11:15:55","slug":"house-probe-into-disinformation-sparks-debate-on-media-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/house-probe-into-disinformation-sparks-debate-on-media-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"House probe into disinformation sparks debate on media freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"

A congressional inquiry into online disinformation has raised<\/a> questions about the balance between accountability and potential threats to press freedom.<\/p>\n

During the third hearing of the House tri-committee on March 21, 2025, bloggers associated with former President Rodrigo Duterte faced<\/a> criticism from lawmakers for spreading false information on social media. The inquiry comes<\/a> amid a political rift between the Duterte and Marcos camps, leading some observers to view the probe as politically motivated.<\/p>\n

Krizette Chu, a prominent blogger, was called out<\/a> for falsely claiming a mass resignation within the Philippine National Police (PNP) – a claim the PNP denied. Mary Jane \u201cMJ\u201d Quiambao Reyes was also confronted<\/a> for alleging that victims of the so-called \u201cwar on drugs\u201d under the former Duterte administration were fabricated. Lawmakers rebuked<\/a> both for using inflammatory language online, with some content creators breaking into tears during the proceedings.<\/p>\n

While the hearings have exposed<\/a> the bloggers\u2019 lack of adherence to journalistic standards, media watchdogs caution against using the inquiry to justify media regulation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hearing was somewhat good in the sense that the \u2018fake news\u2019 purveyors have been exposed<\/a> for who they are,\u201d said University of the Philippines journalism professor Danilo Arao. \u201cBut lawmakers appear to be operating on the framework of legislative intervention through media regulation. That is a very, very ill-advised move,\u201d explained<\/a> Arao.<\/p>\n

Jonathan de Santos, chairperson of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP), echoed<\/a> the concern, warning that the hearings risk becoming a platform for censorship. \u201cIt\u2019s not really about the truth anymore \u2014 it\u2019s more about retaliating against critics,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Proposals such as the formation<\/a> of a government-involved Digital Council of the Philippines have raised red flags among press freedom advocates. While supporters argue that such a body could promote ethical standards among content creators, critics argue that government involvement could compromise<\/a> media independence.<\/p>\n

Arao warned<\/a> that moves to sanction bloggers could eventually be used against mainstream journalists. \u201cIf they can crack<\/a> the whip on bloggers, what\u2019s preventing them from doing the same to professional media organizations?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Instead of focusing on individual content creators, experts urge<\/a> lawmakers to investigate broader disinformation networks and pressure tech platforms to take responsibility for content moderation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photo \u00a9 Raffy Lerma<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A congressional inquiry into online disinformation has raised questions about the balance between accountability and potential threats to press freedom. During the third hearing of the House tri-committee on March 21, 2025, bloggers associated with former President Rodrigo Duterte faced criticism from lawmakers for spreading false information on social media. The inquiry comes amid a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":6762,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[73,65,61,58,59,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11150","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aktuelles-en","category-disinformation","category-freedom-of-press","category-human-rights-news","category-internal-affairs","category-news-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11150"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11162,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11150\/revisions\/11162"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amp.ngo\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}