Project News

Back How to protect digital information working on the frontlines. Recommendations from the Council of Europe experts

How to protect digital information working on the frontlines. Recommendations from the Council of Europe experts

On September 30, 2022, the Council of Europe Project "Support to Safety of Journalists, Media, and of Access to Information, including communication strategy for Prosecutor General’s Office in Ukraine" and the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine held a webinar “Digital safety of journalists and media actors working on the frontlines”.

The purpose of the webinar is to increase the level of knowledge of journalists about the security of communications in the front-line zone and in the occupied territories, as well as about the preparation of devices for travelling to dangerous territories.

Taras Shevchenko, Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine on Eurointegration, in his introductory speech noted the importance of acquiring knowledge about digital security.

"The safety of journalists today is becoming one of the most priority tasks, as it is both a matter of quality coverage of everything that is happening in the war, and guaranteeing the life of every person, which is the highest value for our state. I hope that the attendees of this webinar will be more knowledgeable and feel more secure and more protected after this webinar. I wish everyone to stay safe, fulfil their duties and bring benefits to society," he said.

Steen Nørlov, Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine, noted that the Council of Europe continues to support national partners and the Ukrainian media community in addressing the current needs and consequences of the war. He reminded that according to the Council of Europe standards, the responsibilities of states during aggression include guarantee of safety of national and foreign journalists, freedom of movement and access to information, provision of information to the media and guarantees against undue limitations on freedom of expression. Responsibilities of the journalists include adherence to professional and ethical standards and countering the spread of propaganda and disinformation.

“Unfortunately, journalists and media outlets continue to be targets for the physical and digital attacks which may expose them to discrimination, dangers and even deaths in the course of their work. Regular monitoring of journalists' rights violations in Ukraine demonstrates a significant increase in online threats, online bullying, interference in private life and other forms of human rights violations on the Internet against journalists, bloggers and public activists due to the public nature of their work. In addition, journalists face daily risks of hacking emails, accounts in social networks, in particular to spread disinformation. The most frequent risk of neglecting the basics of digital security is the loss of important information. For a journalist, it is often much more serious than for an average Internet user. In addition to the state's obligation to protect journalists and other media actors, journalists themselves can make important steps towards safer online life”, he said.

The speakers of the webinar were experts of the Digital Security Laboratory, consultants of the Council of Europe Iryna Chulivska and Maksym Lunochkin.

Iryna Chuivska, Council of Europe consultant, expert of the CSO “Digital security lab”, called the most vulnerable methods of communication – phone calls and SMS, because the mobile operator has access to information about the approximate location of the subscriber (when the phone is turned on), information about calls and messages and can listen and record (for example, at the request of law enforcement officers).

Recommendations:

  • Avoid communications on the phone near the front line (or if the interlocutor is near the front line) and on highly sensitive topics.

As for Internet providers and owners of wi-fi networks, they also have access to your messengers, as well as to the sites you use. In the Russian Federation  and in the  temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories, special services automatically monitor Internet traffic.

Recommendations:

  • To hide information from the Internet provider, you can use special programs such as VPN (Psiphon, Tunnel Bear, Mullvad, Proton, Nord, Private Internet Access).
  • It is worth using messengers that do not have access to correspondence (Signal, WhatsApp, Facebook secret chat, Telegram secret chat).
  • It is important to configure two-factor authentication, automatic deletion of correspondence (if there is such an option). You should also regularly check the history of active sessions to make sure that no one else has used your account.

In a war zone, you may find yourself in a situation where your gadgets and information about the Ukrainian military fall into the hands of the Russian military.

Recommendations:

  • Automatically clean all sensitive chats, and remember to manually delete messages regularly.
  • Rename contacts containing the words ZSU, SBU, ATO, etc.
  • Disable auto-save of media files and replace Touch/Face ID with a password.

Today, journalists do not often use email as a means of communication, but it should be remembered that email stores passwords to accounts on other sites, information on Google Drive, etc. That is, if an attacker hacks your mail, he can get data on your information on the network.

Recommendations:

  • Set up unique passwords and two-factor authentication for mail, avoid phishing (a type of online fraud, often fake emails, ads, sites that aim to steal passwords, pin codes, contacts, etc.) and unreliable account recovery methods.

Maksym Lunochkin, Council of Europe consultant, expert of the CSO “Digital security lab”, explained how to prepare devices for a trip to dangerous territories. According to him, among the main problems faced by journalists: forgotten device or account password, lost device, broken device, no connection, no power sources, etc.

Recommendations:

  • Before travelling to dangerous areas, consult with experienced journalists who work on frontlines, or search for information on the Internet (for example, on the websites of IMI or "Detektor Media") about what problems they face.
  • Analyse and assess risks. Understand how they can be prevented and whether there are enough resources for this.
  • Make backup copies of all important data.
  • Print the most important documents.
  • Check the serviceability of devices.
  • Set a unique password or biometrics for unlocking.
  • Encrypt the drive.
  • Store information on cloud services (if necessary, purchase more space for data storage).
  • You should delete previous information from the devices so that it cannot be restored (for example, encrypt the device and then format it, reset the settings to factory settings).

About 50 participants took part in the webinar.

In August 2022, the Project and the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine held a webinar "Digital security of journalists in conditions of war", the speakers of which were also Iryna Chulivska and Maksym Lunochkin.

Earlier, the Council of Europe Project "The European Union and the Council of Europe work together to support media freedom in Ukraine" launched the course "Digital security of journalists and other media actors" on the Prometheus educational platform. The course is aimed at training media professionals and everyone who uses mobile devices, social networks, the Internet and cloud services. It tells how to protect accounts, devices, prevent phishing, hacking and cyber attacks.

The Council of Europe project "Support to Safety of Journalists, Media, and of Access to Information, including communication strategy for Prosecutor General’s Office in Ukraine" aims to support the Ukrainian media community in solving the current needs and consequences of Russian aggression and the war in Ukraine.

Follow the news of the Project on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/CoEUPSIS/.

KYIV, UKRAINE 30 SEPTEMBER 2022
  • Diminuer la taille du texte
  • Augmenter la taille du texte
  • Imprimer la page