Editorial standards

These standards are the floor for journalism published by the group’s titles. They are written so a later audit can test a piece against them. They are not a promise that every story is complete.

Accuracy

Names, titles, dates, places, figures, and quotations are checked before publication. A piece does not state a fact more strongly than the reporting supports. Estimates are labeled as estimates.

Verification

The check matches the claim. A central allegation, a statistic, or a quotation is verified. Color and background are not an excuse to skip a check on the sentence that carries the story.

Verification is recorded inside the newsroom in whatever form that publication uses. This group site does not collect those notes.

A check before publication may be a person’s review or a workflow the publication discloses. A check by another automated system is not a human review. The AI and automation policy draws that line. These standards still require the check. They do not treat an unchecked claim as verified.

Primary and secondary sources

Primary material comes first: the document, the dataset, the recording, the official record, the person in a position to know. Secondary sources are used when primary material is unavailable, and the piece says it is relying on them.

A press release is a claim by its author, not a finding by the publication.

Anonymous sources

Anonymity is rare. It is used when the information matters, the source is in a position to know, and naming them would create a serious risk of harm or of losing the only route to the facts.

The editor responsible for the piece knows the source’s identity. The reader is told why the name is withheld, unless that explanation would itself expose the source. Anonymous color quotes are not used.

Attribution

Other people’s work is credited. A quotation is accurate and is not rearranged to change its meaning. Ellipses are not used to hide a material qualification.

Corrections, updates, and editor’s notes

A factual error is corrected on the page, with a note of what changed and when. The original error is not silently overwritten.

An update adds new information without pretending the first version was wrong. An editor’s note explains a problem of framing, omission, or process. A retraction is reserved for a piece whose central claim does not stand. The corrections and complaints procedure is the public route.

News, analysis, and opinion

News reports what happened and what can be supported. Analysis interprets a verified record and says that it is analysis. Opinion argues and is labeled as opinion.

A column does not masquerade as a report. A report does not smuggle a conclusion into a headline that the body does not support.

Conflicts

Journalists and editors disclose material personal, financial, and institutional interests to their editor before publication. Interests that a reader would need in order to judge the piece are disclosed in the piece. Gifts and paid trips from the subject of coverage are refused.

Fairness

A person or organization facing a serious criticism is given a fair chance to respond when they can be reached and when waiting does not conceal a risk the public needs to know. Their response is considered. They do not approve the copy.

Plagiarism

Copying another writer’s language, structure, or original reporting without credit is prohibited. Background facts that are widely known still need a source when a specific figure or finding is used.

Images

Photographs and video depict what the caption says they depict. A picture is not staged and then presented as spontaneous. Crops and tonal adjustments that do not change the meaning are allowed. Manipulations that add, remove, or move elements are not, unless the image is clearly a graphic or an illustration.

Archival images are dated and credited. People who are not the subject of the story are not identified for flavor.

Synthetic media and manipulation

Synthetic or heavily manipulated media is not presented as a recording of a real event. If a publication uses a synthetic image or audio for a stated reason, it labels it before the reader can mistake it for evidence.

A fabricated quotation is prohibited whether a person or a system produced it.

Statistics, polls, and scientific evidence

Figures carry their source, date, and, where it changes the meaning, the definition or denominator. Polls carry the pollster, the dates in the field, the population, the sample size, and the margin of error when the pollster publishes one.

A single study is not a settled conclusion. The piece distinguishes a finding, a preprint, and a consensus. Uncertainty that the researchers state is not edited out.

Privacy

Private individuals are not identified unless the identification is relevant. Contact details, medical information, and precise home locations are not published for curiosity. Children are not interviewed or identified in a way that trades their privacy for color.

How these standards are used

Editors apply them piece by piece. Applying them does not mean a natural person reviewed every item before publication. Where a workflow publishes without that review, the automation policy requires the publication to say so on the article. A person remains accountable for corrections.

The group does not pre-clear publication stories on this website. A reader who sees a breach uses the complaints procedure. A publication may publish a stricter standard of its own. That standard still has to meet this one.