2025 Press Freedom Predators
For International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists, celebrated on 2 November, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is unveiling the profiles of 34 press freedom predators who attacked journalists and the right to information in 2025. What do they have in common? A hatred of press freedom. Their methods differ, but their objectives converge: silencing independent media voices and trampling on the right to news and information. Murder, imprisonment, smears, propaganda, troll armies – all these are means to impose silence. Unveiling these names on this symbolic day serves as a reminder that impunity is not inevitable. Those who trample on the freedom to inform must be named and held accountable.
Methodology
The 2025 Press Freedom Predators list serves as a counterpart to the World Press Freedom Index published annually by RSF. While the Index assesses the state of press freedom in countries, this list highlights those who trample it underfoot. These predators are divided into five categories, directly derived from the Index's indicators: political, security, economic, legal and social. Each predator is located in accordance with the attacks carried out in 2025: those who use the state apparatus to muzzle the media; those who resort to physical violence against journalists or imprison them; those who financially cripple news media; those who manipulate the law to imprison or censor; and those who incite hatred toward the profession. Who are they? What was their hit list in 2025? And what were their deadly weapons?
They kill, censor, imprison and assault journalists, throttle news media, denigrate journalism, or use its codes to manipulate information for propaganda purposes. Yet again in 2025, media professionals were targeted by increasingly diverse predatory techniques.
“Let us commend the ability of the media’s enemies to constantly renew the nature of their attacks against journalism. This latest edition of the Press Freedom Predators highlights the diversity of the threats. While some politicians throttle reliable information, other predators murder or imprison journalists, while yet others manipulate media funding or use public statements or legal action to silence reporters. By unveiling their portraits on this symbolic day for the fight against impunity, RSF points out that impunity is not inevitable, that those who trample on the freedom to inform must be named and held accountable.
They include those who have relentlessly persecuted the media for years – the Chinese Communist Party with Xi Jinping at its head, Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman, Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko. All of them once again distinguished themselves in 2025 with their unrestrained perseciution of journalists and media.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF), responsible for the deaths of nearly 220 journalists under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, are obviously included. Myanmar’s State Peace and Security Commission and Burkina Faso’s military junta, led by Capt. Ibrahim Traoré, are equally adept at silencing those who report independently. In Mexico, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) emerged in 2025 as the country's most violent criminal organisation and one of the most formidable predators of journalism.
Because they throttle news media or subject them to arbitrary judicial pressure, Brendan Carr, the head of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in the United States, Deputy Prosecutor Seng Heang in Cambodia, and the Georgian billionaire oligarch and former prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili are included in this list of 2025 predators.
In 2025, those who prey on press freedom are also distinguished by their increased use of technology to restrict the freedom to report the news. While Xi Jinping uses Chinese chatbots to disseminate state propaganda, Elon Musk uses his social media X to harass journalists, and the IDF, already responsible for the deaths of hundreds of journalists, conduct online smear campaigns to discredit journalism. As for OpIndia, the Hindu nationalist website has stepped up its disinformation and harassment campaigns against journalists critical of the Indian government in 2025.
For the 2025 edition, RSF is highlighting nine of the 34 press freedom predators by means of a unique “Guess Who?” game. It's your turn! Each card provides one to four clues to help you guess who is hiding behind these faces of censorship and repression. A game that is intended to be both fun and thought-provoking, offering a new way to raise awareness of the threats facing journalism worldwide.
Click on the photo to find out more about the predator.
