Maria Ressa is the co-founder, CEO and President of Rappler, the digital news site in the Philippines known for its hard-hitting investigative journalism, and co-chair of The International Fund for Public Interest Media. She was awarded the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize together with Dmitry Muratov “for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace.” She is the author of How to Stand Up to a Dictator: The Fight for Our Future, published in November 2022.
A journalist in Asia for more than 35 years, she has endured political harassment and arrests, and been forced to post bail ten times to continue her work. Maria was awarded the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize together with Dmitry Muratov “for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace.” Awarding her the Unesco/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize in April 2021, the jury said: “Maria Ressa’s unerring fight for freedom of expression is an example for many journalists around the world. Her case is emblematic of global trends that represent a real threat to press freedom, and therefore to democracy.” For her work on disinformation and fake news, Ms. Ressa was named Time magazine’s 2018 Person of the Year and has received many other international awards.
Before founding Rappler, Maria focused on investigating terrorism in Southeast Asia, running CNN’s Manila bureau for nearly a decade, followed by the Jakarta bureau from 1995 to 2005. She wrote Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al Qaeda’s Newest Center of Operations in Southeast Asia, published in 2003; and From Bin Laden to Facebook: 10 Days of Abduction, 10 Years of Terrorism, published in 2013