The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "Internet" ...
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WSJ China's Troubled Transition
During his years in China, British businessman Neil Heywood cut a rather eccentric figure, cruising around Beijing in a silver Jaguar with “007” license plates and boasting implausibly about his connections to senior Communist Party officials. When he was found dead in a second-rate provincial hotel room in November 2011—of “excessive alcohol consumption,” according to local authorities—he was immediately cremated and seemingly just as quickly forgotten. Forgotten, that is, until Wall Street Journal reporter Jeremy Page began digging into the case. Using his wide network of local and foreign contacts, the Beijing correspondent discovered that this was much more than a sad case of expat overindulgence. It turned out that Mr. Heywood was in fact very close to the wife of Bo Xilai, a Communist Party rising star—and that he had told friends he feared she might do him harm. The investigation lifted the lid on the extravagant, and often lawless, private lives of the country's elite—a forbidden topic for Chinese media, and one rarely touched on by the foreign press. Mr. Page’s reports, devoured by China’s vast population of Internet users, sparked massive public debate and may even have altered the course of China’s once-a-decade leadership transition.
Tags: Bo Xilai; China; Communist Party; death
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Social network analysis of high-ranking officials in S. Korean government
It is a social network analysis-based investigative reporting on high ranking public officials in the Lee Myung-bak administration and his presidential office. Since its launch in 2008, the Lee administration has been criticized for the dark side of spoils system or cronyism in personnel affairs. The JoongAng Ilbo investigated on the "chain of relationships" among 944 high-ranking officials and President Lee for the last four years. We also used text-mining methodology on social media, such as Internet blogs and twitter, which showed the public's sentiments toward the cronyism of the Lee government.
Tags: Social network; public officials; presidential office; cronyism
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Benghazi: US Consulate Attack
On September 11, when a militant group overran the US consulate in Benghazi resulting in the death of the ambassador, the initial information was contradictory. Much of it got mixed up with other reports out of the Middle East about anti-American demonstrations over an inflammatory film on the Internet that was said to insult Islam. Damon arrived quickly in Benghazi to sort out the conflicting information and went to the burnt consulate ruins, which, though looted, held valuable clues to the truth. Her reporting revealed that there was not a demonstration and that it appeared to have been a planned attack that unfolded simultaneously from three sides. She discovered that U.S. diplomats had been warned by Libyan officials three days before the attack that the security situation in the city was out of their control. Though her reporting received harsh public criticism from the State Department at the time, the U.S. government’s own investigation later proved her reporting to be accurate in an episode that continues to reverberate politically. Damon also spoke to Libyans that tried to save the ambassador that night, shedding light on what happened to him during his final hours. While she was in Benghazi, demonstrations erupted against the militia believed to be responsible for the attack, and Damon further reported on the rise in extremism in the newly-liberated country. Her reporting provided additional valuable context about the milieu in which the consulate attack occurred.
Tags: Middle East; Libya; U.S. ambassador; Benghazi; militant group
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Poverty Stretches the Digital Divide
The principle finding of the story was that even though broadband penetration is growing, large swaths of the nation, particularly in the rural South, are lagging behind.
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Wired for Repression
Bloomberg's series "Wired for Repression" revealed the extent to which Western companies have sold surveillance systems to authoritarian countries, including Iran, Syria, Bahrain and Tunisia, which have used them to track, imprison, torture and kill. The newest newest artillery for reprssive regimes, the gear allows authorities to intercept their citizens' e-mails and text messages, monitor Internet activity and locate political targets through cell phone technology.
Tags: torture; surveillance; imprisonment; censorship
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Criminalizing Cartoons
The investigation exposes a police chief's desperate attempt to acquire the name of an anonymous cartoonist, mocking his department on the Internet. A person going by the moniker MrFiddlesticks (and other names) was airing internal affairs dirty laundry in the form of parody. To find out who, the city prosecutor, police chief and a local judge teamed up to craft a criminal search warrant. KIRO-TV's investigative unit not only uncovered questionable legal tactics (like prosecutor shopping), but later caught police shredding hundreds of records related the case. First Amendment and FOIA issues are central to this ongoing investigation.
Tags: cartoonist; search warrant; shredding
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Tucson Tragedy
Within a few hours of the horrific shooting of 19 people, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, at a Tucson-area grocery, The Republic focused on two paramount questions in the investigative part of its coverage: What motive and circumstance drove the alleged shooter to act, and what enabled him to succeed? In the short amount of time they had, The Republic staff reached the community college where the alleged shooter had studied, contacted friends and found video and Internet postings of his.
Tags: Gabrielle Giffords; Tucson shooting; breaking news; mentally ill
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Fatal System Error
The book details the inner workings of the criminal internet hackers and their links to government.
Tags: internet; hacking; cyber criminals
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Photocopiers Hidden Danger
Many Americans are unaware that digital office copiers have hard drives in them. CBS News proves how easy it is to read the hard drives using software downloaded from the internet. Security experts say that criminal groups and foreign intelligence services are buying the machines for the documents they may hold.
Tags: technology; hard drive; copy; machine; foreign intelligence; domestic
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"What They Know"
For this series, The Wall Street Journal developed its own "proprietary data and analytical methods" to expose how Internet use of individuals is being tracked, and how the information is being used by certain companies to develop explicit files about the users' lives. The Journal went on to reveal surprising ways in which the data "are being used."
Tags: tracking, Internet; database; cookies; beacons; Microsoft; Flowing Data