Deception for Journalism's Sake: A Database

Deception for Journalism's Sake: A Database

Nellie Bly of The New York World

A gathering of the undercover and experiential reporting of Elizabeth Cochrane, later Seaman, who wrote under the pen name of Nellie Bly.

Nellie Bly, posed as

Jail Time Undercover

Reporters have worked as guards or gotten themselves arrested -- sometimes with the aid of authorities and sometimes without -- to investigate conditions inside prisons and jails.

Ben Bagdikian, Charles Howe, Nellie Bly, Pierre Salinger, posed as, R.H. Ring, Richard H. Stewart, Ted Conover, Tim Findley

Homelessness, Down-and-Out, Broke

Among the most common of poses: journalists who elect to live as tramps, the homeless, or the abject poor.

hoboes, homelessness, lived among, lived among, posed as, posed as, tramps

"Blackbirding" - The Slave System's Just-as-Evil Twin?

Journalists from the United States and Australia get inside the post-Civil War practice of recruiting Pacific Islanders to work the world's non-U.S. plantations on extended contracts of indenture.

colonialism, George Morrison, indenture, J.D. Melvin, missionaries, San Francisco Chronicle, slave ships, slavery, The Age, The Argus, the south, Undercover, W.H. Brommage

Undercover in U.S. Political Campaigns

Going undercover as volunteers or invited guests has gotten reporters an inside look at some U.S. political campaigns. So has shadowing the candidates in their off-hours. 

Barack Obama, campaign, George Bush, Hillary Clinton, presidential, U.S. political campaigns, worked as

Lapses

These are examples of undercover reportage that were considered to have crossed ethical lines or that caused major legal wrangles.

Watchdogs in the Public Interest

Waste, fraud, graft, laxity, dilapidated conditions, corruption: Reporters have often used undercover tactics to investigate.

graft, insurance, lobbyists, posed as, poverty programs, trucking, vote fraud, Welfare, worked as