Editorial Standards

Each material fact in an entry must be supported by evidence we could produce if asked.

A source’s substance, status and context are described faithfully. Quotations are never cut so that their meaning shifts.

What we cannot reasonably verify is not written as settled.

A sentence can be true on its own and still leave a false impression. We test accuracy against what a reader would take away from the whole entry, not line by line.

We avoid phrasing that quietly upgrades a claim into a fact. A person who has been:

• arrested has not, for that reason, been charged;
• charged has not been convicted;
• sued has not, for that reason, been found liable;
• named in an FCA warning has not, for that reason, been found by a court to have committed fraud.

Where proceedings are still running, that is stated near the top of the entry, not left to a footnote.

Titles, headlines, search snippets, social posts and captions must fairly reflect the entry underneath. A careful paragraph further down does not excuse a misleading headline.

We do not use sensational wording to chase clicks or rankings.

Words such as scammer, fraudster, criminal, conman or corrupt are never applied as a statement of fact to a named person or business unless a competent court or authority has decided the matter and the evidence supports that precise wording.

Where a claim comes from a complainant, the police, a prosecutor, a regulator, a party to litigation, a witness or another source, we say so wherever the reader needs that to judge its weight:

Attribution is never removed to make a sentence sound sharper.

Adverse material is published with the context needed to stop it creating a false picture. That can include:

A matter the record shows has ended is not presented as if it were live.

Where reasonably practicable and appropriate, the subject is given enough detail to understand the main adverse points and a fair opportunity to answer before publication.

How long they are given depends on the complexity and urgency of the matter.

Replies and any documents sent with them are considered before we publish. A reply does not oblige us to accept it, and no reply is never read as an admission.

We may trim a response for length, relevance, repetition, legal risk, privacy or clarity rather than printing it in full.

We will not cut it so that it misstates the subject’s position. Documents sent with a response that change the picture are assessed before publication.

Appearing in a document is not, by itself, a reason to name someone. The editor weighs:

• the part the person actually played;
• whether naming them serves a real public interest;
• how strong the evidence is;
• their privacy and any vulnerability;
• the harm that naming could foreseeably cause;
• any reporting restriction;
• whether readers need the name to follow the entry.

Private individuals with a peripheral role are treated with particular care.

Children, victims, witnesses and vulnerable people receive additional protection.

Their names, images, addresses and identifying details are not published just because they can be found elsewhere. We observe court orders under the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 and the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999, and the lifelong anonymity that the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1992 gives to complainants of sexual offences.

Research regularly turns up information that has no place in public.

Home addresses, private phone numbers, personal email addresses, National Insurance and passport numbers, bank details, information about children and other sensitive data stay out unless publication is lawful, necessary and justified by a substantial public interest.

The entry carries what readers need to understand the matter, not everything the researcher found.

Photographs, screenshots, charts and other images must not imply anything the evidence does not support, and are never altered in a way that changes what they show.

Illustrations and stock images are never presented so that they could pass for documentary evidence. Captions say plainly what an image does and does not establish.

Researchers and writers may lawfully use:

We never authorise unauthorised access to computer systems, theft, bribery, trespass, unlawful surveillance, unlawful impersonation or fabricated evidence. Any unusual technique that raises a legal or ethical question is reviewed before it is used.

Once research and verification have reached the right stage, the writer receives the evidence needed to prepare the entry. The job is not to heighten it but to set out plainly:

• what happened;
• what is alleged;
• what is documented;
• what has been decided;
• what the subject says; and
• what remains unknown or disputed.

The entry stays inside those limits.

Material investigations may, where required, be reviewed under the law of England and Wales and of any other jurisdiction involved before publication, following our internal procedures. The review can look at:

It supports editorial judgment; it does not replace it.

Writers, researchers, editors and reviewers declare any personal, financial, professional or other interest connected with a subject.

Where an interest could reasonably cast doubt on the work, the person steps aside or the conflict is otherwise properly managed.

Where a source is in a commercial or personal dispute with a subject, that is taken into account in deciding how far to rely on them.

Read the conflict register

We accept no payment, gift, favour or other benefit from a subject in exchange for:

Research Membership carries no editorial say. A member’s evidence is assessed in exactly the same way as anyone else’s.

When a material statement proves wrong, it is corrected promptly. When new evidence changes the picture without disproving it, the entry is updated.

Material corrections are made openly where appropriate. The point is an accurate record, not a smaller mistake.

Automated tools and AI may help sort documents, search, translate, match names to companies or flag possible leads. Tracer, our research system, works in this way.

Output from an AI system is not evidence because a machine produced it. Any material fact found that way is checked against reliable sources before publication.

AI is never used to invent quotes, sources, interviews, documents or evidence. People, not software, are accountable for what we publish.

Pages may be structured so that entries are easy to find and understand in search engines and elsewhere.

That is never a licence to exaggerate. Titles, descriptions, structured data and summaries meet the same accuracy and attribution rules as the entry itself.

Material entries can show when they were published, when they were last reviewed and how they have changed.

Where later events change what an earlier, accurate statement means, the statement is not left standing without explanation.