Many Newspapers Forbid Anonymous Sourcing

[dave502d]

NEW YORK - Editors at about one in four newspapers who responded to a survey say they never allow reporters to quote anonymous sources, and most others have policies designed to limit the practice. One editor said his paper's rules are so strict they would have disqualified Deep Throat as a source.
The use of anonymous sources - people who give reporters information only on condition that their identities not be divulged - has been much in the news recently, notably in a case that prompted a Newsweek magazine retraction. The issue came up again last week with the disclosure that Deep Throat, The Washington Post's legendary Watergate source, had been an FBI official.

The Associated Press and the Associated Press Managing Editors association decided to jointly survey American newspapers to find out what their practices are. The project, believed to be the most comprehensive of its kind conducted in recent years, drew replies from 419 publications - about 28 percent of the nation's 1,450 daily newspapers.

Editors at 103 papers, nearly all of them in small and mid-size markets, said they do not ever permit reporters to cite anonymous sources in their articles.

"Our policy is to get people on the record. Period," said Eileen Lehnert, editor of the Jackson (Mich.) Citizen Patriot. "Once you operate from that standpoint, you rarely have to reconsider your position."

Newspapers that do allow use of unnamed sources include those based in large cities and operating bureaus overseas or in Washington, where requests by sources for anonymity occur often. Most of these papers say they have formal policies intended to minimize the reliance on anonymity.

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[FloridaPat]

1. However, if they report from AP on national issues, I bet they report word

for word, including anonymous sources. At this point, I assume any article about our gov't with anonymous sources is propaganda.