As reported recently in the Committee to Protect Journalists’ (CPJ) annual report - Attacks on the Press - for 2009, over half of imprisoned members of the press globally either work online or are bloggers.

Reports of spying and espionage are two of the main reasons given for holding media (The Epoch Times talks about Maziar Bahari, who was held captive for 118 days in Iran), and the CPJ states that this is a sign of ‘things to come’. Bahari’s case is particularly relevant to this point, as Iran’s government restricts the flow of news to its citizens, and to those outside of the country to global media.

Bahari’s was a high profile case, but he was a Newsweek reporter (owned by The Washington Post Company). It was on the front page, people were talking about it, and the backing of both organisations helped to keep him safe. The CPJ states that independent writers are at a greater risk as they don’t have this resource behind them. Quite often they’ll be writing for a niche publications, or for themselves.

Politics is obviously an emotive and delicate subject, especially for a foreign journalist arriving in a country to report on the nuances of a place they don’t live in – or understand. It’s not surprising that of the 52 journalists killed last year, 75% were linked to political motivation. Just last week, unidentified gunmen in Honduras killed a reporter and seriously wounded a colleague, according to local reports. An outspoken and controversial journalist, Karol Cabrera is known for her support of the coup that ousted former president Manuel Zelaya in June 2009, and her video reports are all over YouTube.

As the reach and distribution of online content becomes easier and more prolific, the risk for writers and bloggers who cover controversial topics increases. The opportunity to speak freely is a wonderful thing, but when a brand starts to engage with bloggers, should it also take responsibility for what they write? If a pharmaceutical company works with a pro-choice blogger to promote a morning after pill, and that person is attacked, should the company step up to support them?

There’s no need to take this out of context. as the examples above are worst case scenarios and unfortunately the majority of people getting arrested are full-time writers – talking about extremely evocative topics. Even still, political and news organisations are aware of the issues, so shouldn’t brands think about the repercussions as well?

Image via Ethan Ham