• As dissed on Fox NewS •
Shooting the Messenger
online reporting by INDependent journalist Dean Sterling Jones
“If you need someone to do great reporting about shady schemes, scams, digital media skullduggery, and disinfo, consider hiring Dean!”
— Craig Silverman, ProPublica reporter & author of Regret the Error —
“Boorish and offensive”
— Yevgeny Prigozhin, deceased Russian warlord —
Latest Posts
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Prigozhin’s Propagandists Scurry After His Plane — and His African ThinkTank — Go Up in Flames
Read more: Prigozhin’s Propagandists Scurry After His Plane — and His African ThinkTank — Go Up in FlamesMaria Butina told me last year that she worked for the Foundation for the Protection of National Values, a thinktank that the U.S. government sanctioned for aiding Yevgeny Prigozhin’s global propaganda efforts. The website is now defunct, like him. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the notorious Russian leader of the invasion of Ukraine and the failed coup against…
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Indicted Russian Responds to My Recent Lawfare Article
Read more: Indicted Russian Responds to My Recent Lawfare Article“[YOU] CALL ME FOREST GUMP hinting at amateurism on my part. Here I want to answer you, Forest, although he was a simple man […] conquered the hearts of Americans and became a hero.” Last month, freelance Aussie journalist Elise Thomas and I published an article for Lawfare about Russian businessman Alexander Ionov, who has…
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Russia’s Latest Troll Site is a Total Failure
Read more: Russia’s Latest Troll Site is a Total FailureTHE FOUNDATION TO BATTLE INJUSTICE claims to be a human rights organisation for victims of state violence in predominantly English-speaking countries. Dubbed the “Russian FBI” in its home country, the organisation is, in fact, the latest project of Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was recently added to the American FBI’s “Most Wanted” list for allegedly organising online…
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“Putin’s Cook” Behind New Russian Action Film
Read more: “Putin’s Cook” Behind New Russian Action FilmTHE FILM marks Yevgeny Prigozhin’s third foray into film-making — and the arrival of a reality-bending new species of Russian propaganda. On Wednesday, a trailer for upcoming Russian action film, ТУРИСТ (“Tourist”), dropped on YouTube. The film ostensibly tells the true story of Russia’s involvement in the Central African Republic (CAR), and, according to promotional…
Meet the Russians
“Great read on Alexander Ionov after his recent indictment”
— Clarissa Ward, CNN’s chief international correspondent —
“A great report”
— Rachel Maddow, The Rachel Maddow Show —
Recent Bylines
& Credits
About Me
Based in Northern Ireland, but work mainly in the U.S.
Bootstrapped a freelance journalism career by publishing original reporting via this blog. Rolling Stone EIC Noah Shachtman gave me my break. I work in kitchens when not sleuthing online. Love Tom Verlaine and unusual-looking lamps.
My Work
Interested in propaganda and digital trickery.
I’ve been published by, among others, Forbes, The Guardian, BuzzFeed News, Foreign Policy, and The Daily Beast, garnering praise from the likes of CNN’s Clarissa Ward and ProPublica’s Craig Silverman. I use open-source tools to find stories such as my Snopes plagiarism exposé.
Impact
A thorn in the side of all manner of shady characters.
My reporting has been cited by every major U.S. news outlet, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Fox News, which broadcast that I was “wasting all of [my] time“. Russian warlord Yevgeny Prigozhin once tried to troll me and Indian police have accused me of trying to incite civil unrest.
Interviews & Selected
Media Mentions
Shooting the Messenger 