For ten years now, the Radio France investigation unit has offered listeners investigations on extremely diverse subjects, investigations on health, the pharmaceutical industry for example, also in different areas of consumption, and then very sensitive investigations on political affairs, some of which have had considerable impact, and also major international investigations, or even on the environment.
Emmanuelle Daviet: The objective, obviously, is to reveal abuses, scandals or information of general interest, most of the time hidden. Before addressing the listeners’ questions, can you remind us of Jacques Monin, why the investigation unit was created in 2014 at Radio France?
Jacques Monin: It was created because investigation was very little or almost not present on the radio. It is true that when we think of major investigations, we think more of the written press, which has brought out major cases: The Chained Duck, The World. There is a pure player called Mediapart, which is renowned for its investigations. But on the radio, ultimately, we produced very little, because we don’t have the time, quite simply, because the radio, and we see this mainly at franceinfo, is a continuous news channel .
We cover the news on the radio, but we have little time to be able to do this news. And the idea was to say to ourselves: for that, we must create a dedicated cell, a cell that takes time, which ultimately frees itself from the functioning of the editorial staff, to be able to investigate, and therefore produce exclusive information. , which also differentiate us from what we can hear or read in others.
So listeners have regularly written to us about your reports and wondered about the way you choose the themes of your investigations. Are there areas or subjects that you prohibit yourself from, for example?
Two different things. No, we don’t forbid ourselves anything. Then, how do we choose our subjects? Our subjects, there are what we call informants, or sometimes whistleblowers, who inform us of things that are happening inside a company, inside an administration, and who consider that it poses ethical problems, and that it should be revealed, that it is of public interest. At that time, we investigate and that allows us to get out, to reveal information.
There is also current events which are a great source of inspiration for us, but not at the same pace as other editorial offices. That is to say, we are interested in current events when they have disappeared from the radar, but in disappearing, they have still left unanswered questions. Here, we take ownership of these questions and try to answer them.
And then the third engine, which triggers an investigation, is the spirit of the times. When Russia goes to war in Ukraine, it creates a shock on a global scale, which makes it difficult to escape from this theme. But we tell ourselves how to deal with this subject, and we find subjects for investigation.
For example, we carried out an investigation into the rearmament of France, how the arms industry is being reconfigured. Precisely, in the wake of the war in Ukraine. And that was an intuition. It was a moment where we said to ourselves: we cannot ignore this subject, but without initially knowing where we were going to go.
In order for ordinary citizens to write to you when they have weak or strong signals, for example within their company, which could lead to the launch of an investigation, you considered it necessary to open a platform. So, what exactly does it consist of?
Indeed, two years ago we created an alert platform, which is encrypted and secure, which therefore allows everyone to send us information without taking the slightest risk. Moreover, if you send us information, you do not appear. It is, if you wish, that we can then establish a dialogue, and possibly identify you, but not at first.
And this platform has already brought us in one year, 80 pieces of information that we have sometimes given, delivered to the editorial staff of Radio France, to franceinfo in particular, and other information that we have used ourselves. This is what we do The world And Mediapart. But the radio did not have such a tool and in the audiovisual landscape, the only radio to have it today is the investigation unit of Radio France. At the end of all our articles, you have a link which allows you, by clicking on it, to access this platform.
Listeners say they are very concerned about the inflation of false information circulating, and some would like to know how, in the era of disinformation, you see the future of investigative journalism?
So I think we need to take ownership of these technologies, precisely to uncover the misuse that can be made of them. Afterwards, we didn’t wait for the explosion of ChatGPT and artificial intelligence, we were already using what we call OSINT, (“Open source intelligence” means in French “r
And these tools allow us to discover and unearth a lot of information, including hidden information, which is actually on sites, but which we don’t see. And then the second direction that we have already taken but that we need to expand is collaborative journalism.
That is to say that when we put together – whether with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, or with Forbidden Stories, with whom we have carried out many investigations, when we put together journalists, sometimes hundreds on a global scale, with very diverse skills, we can all “cross-check” each other, bring and support each other with different skills to be able to better verify, better control information which effectively tends to become, and particularly with social networks, out of control.