Journalism increasingly relies on images and videos captured by eyewitnesses to report the news. Today, this is not a straightforward process when working in an increasingly fragmented and visually saturated digital information environment, where anyone can claim anything. This dissertation finds that Norwegian journalists as a result have expanded their practices for verifying images drawing on inspiration from military intelligence and the investigative group Bellingcat. This led to a new approach termed “substantiated verification”, which moves beyond simple labels of “true” or “false”, and instead documents in detail what is known and unknown about an image.
The dissertation’s focal point is a unique cross-newsroom collaborative project called Faktisk Verifiserbar, Norwegian journalism’s collective response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The dissertation studies both social media apps used to disseminate such eyewitness images, and journalists working at the receiving end, to verify and report the news. It reveals how the social media apps systematically strip away information the journalists need, forcing journalists to seek inspiration from outside their profession to conduct verification.
However, importing knowledge practices from outside your field comes at a cost. Relying on practices developed outside journalism could raise questions about journalistic authority and autonomy. Through a futures-oriented analysis, four different scenarios and two underlying metaphors for this kind of journalistic work are presented in the dissertation.
Ståle Bjørlykke Grut successfully defended his thesis on 19 May 2026.
Trial lecture
Designated topic: How should (audio)visual investigative journalism navigate the ethical distinction between public evidence and user surveillance.
Evaluation committee
- Senior Lecturer Jenny Wiik, University of Gothenburg (first opponent)
- Associate Professor Jon Inge Faldalen, University of Oslo (substitute second opponent)
- Professor Kari Andén-Papadopoulos, Stockholm University
- Professor Kim Wilkins, University of Oslo (substitute committee administrator)
Chair of the defence
- Head of Department Kjetil Rødje, University of Oslo
Supervisors
- Professor Liv Hausken, University of Oslo
- Professor Steen Steensen, Oslo Metropolitan University