Four UK news outlets unpublished a man’s name after he said he didn’t know he was being interviewed.
The source, Abi Osinyemi, complained to the UK press regulator the Independent Press Standards Organisation over articles from This Is Local London, MyLondon.News, YourLocalGuardian, and the Croydon Guardian. Newsquest Media owns all but MyLondon.News, which is owned by Reach PLC.
In question was an Oct. story about the area of Croydon, which quoted numerous residents or workers from the area. Osinyemi said the reporter approached him saying “the Council wanted to hear people’s thoughts and experiences because they wanted to take steps to improve the area” and he didn’t know she was a reporter and wouldn’t have spoken to her if he had known. He said he then contacted the reporter after publication and asked her to take his quotes out.
All four outlets stood by their reports, with the Newsquest Media outlets saying it got the article from a “reliable syndicate.” The Newquest outlets agreed to remove Osinyemi’s name from the article and leave his quotes to resolve his complaint.
The Reach PLC-owned news outlet, MyLondon.News, however defended its article by pointing to the reporter’s notes, which iMediaEthics notes doesn’t address the issue of how the reporter identified herself.
Ultimately, Reach PLC’s MyLondon.News agreed to unpublish the quotes “as a gesture of goodwill,” IPSO reported. As such all four complaints were resolved when the man’s name was at least removed from the article.
Reach PLC declined to comment to iMediaEthics. iMediaEthics has written to Newsquest.