The Intercept
Investigative news website launched in February 2014 by Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras and Jeremy Scahill, funded by Pierre Omidyar's First Look Media
| The Intercept
| |
|---|---|
| Logo |  The Intercept logo (used under fair use) |
| Type | News website (nonprofit-funded)[1] |
| Founded | 10 February 2014[2] |
| Founder(s) | Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras and Jeremy Scahill[1] |
| Status | Active; published by First Look Media[3] |
| Services | National security, politics, civil liberties and technology reporting; publication of source documents[1][3] |
| Key people | Betsy Reed (editor-in-chief, per the site's 2018 About page); Pierre Omidyar (funder)[1] |
| Website | theintercept.com |
| Remarks | Founding editors' focus: reporting based on Edward Snowden's documents[2] |
The Intercept is an American online news publication founded by the journalists Glenn Greenwald, Laura Poitras and Jeremy Scahill, who, according to its About page, decided after the 2013 disclosures by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to found "a new media organization dedicated to the kind of reporting those disclosures required".[1] It was the first publication of First Look Media, the venture of eBay founder Pierre Omidyar.[2]
Launch and funding
The site was unveiled on 10 February 2014 with two stories: one by Scahill and Greenwald, citing an unnamed former drone operator, on the use of cell phone geolocation to help target US drone strikes, and a set of aerial photographs of US intelligence facilities. The Guardian reported that the editors said they had accelerated the launch "to fight intensifying attacks on journalists working on stories about government surveillance", and that its focus would be "overwhelmingly on the NSA story" at first.[2] The editors' statement, quoted by Nieman Lab, said that the site's longer-term mission was "aggressive and independent adversarial journalism" across issues from secrecy and civil liberties violations to corruption, and that it would publish the original source documents on which its reporting was based.[3]
The site's About page says Omidyar "provided the funding to launch The Intercept and continues to support it through First Look Media Works, a nonprofit organization", and that it also runs a sustaining membership programme.[1]
Reporting on GCHQ and the Snowden documents
In February 2014 Greenwald co-published a series with NBC News on the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG), a unit of GCHQ, based on classified documents from the Snowden archive. On 24 February 2014 he wrote on The Intercept that the series had been based on four classified GCHQ documents, and he described "two tactics" among JTRIG's "core self-identified purposes": injecting false material onto the internet to destroy the reputation of its targets, and using social science and other techniques to manipulate online discourse and activism.[4] GCHQ's response to the NBC reports is recorded on the JTRIG page.
Greenwald's resignation (2020)
On 29 October 2020 Greenwald announced that he was resigning from The Intercept and from First Look Media, writing that its editors had "censored" an article he had written about Joe Biden, in violation of his contractual right of editorial freedom, and that the site's current form was "completely unrecognizable" compared with its original vision.[5][6] The Intercept's editor-in-chief, Betsy Reed, called the censorship charge "preposterous" and said the dispute stemmed from "a fundamental disagreement over the role of editors in the production of journalism and the nature of censorship".[6] Greenwald said he would publish on Substack.[5]
Brazil
Reporting by The Intercept and its Brazilian edition, The Intercept Brasil, from June 2019 on a leaked archive of messages concerning the "Operation Car Wash" anti-corruption task force included communications which the publication said showed improper coordination between prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol and the judge Sérgio Moro; the publication said an anonymous source supplied the material.[7] In January 2020 Brazilian federal prosecutors charged Greenwald with cybercrimes, alleging that he was part of a "criminal" group that hacked officials' phones. Greenwald said he "did nothing more than do [his] job as a journalist".[7] On 6 February 2020 a federal judge rejected the charges against Greenwald, citing an order by a Supreme Court justice that barred investigation of the journalist over the reporting; The Guardian reported that the judge accepted charges against six alleged hackers.[7][8]
See also
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 The Intercept, About & Contacts, archived 30 October 2018, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Glenn Greenwald's new website launches with fresh NSA revelations, The Guardian, 10 February 2014, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 First Look Media publishes its first stories, Nieman Journalism Lab, 10 February 2014, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ Glenn Greenwald, How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputations, The Intercept, 24 February 2014, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Glenn Greenwald, My Resignation From The Intercept, Substack, 29 October 2020, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Glenn Greenwald resigns from the Intercept over 'editorial freedom', The Guardian, 29 October 2020, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, RCFP analysis: Brazil indicts Intercept's Glenn Greenwald for cybercrimes, updated 7 February 2020, accessed 13 November 2026.
- ↑ Brazil: judge dismisses cybercrimes accusations against Glenn Greenwald, The Guardian, 6 February 2020, accessed 13 November 2026.