Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Countries that are members of the United Nations are committed to upholding the charter, including Article 19, but that hasn't stopped some countries from suppressing their own news media and blocking access to international news. In some cases, journalists have been killed, imprisoned, or exiled for trying to do their jobs

As new technology changes the way journalists do their work, media laws are being reexamined. At the forefront are questions such as: Should online reporters be granted the same rights and protections as journalists working for established news organizations? Should those same privileges extend to Internet bloggers? These questions are likely to remain unresolved for some time.

Reporters obviously are subject to other laws that apply to individuals in a given country, such as laws governing privacy. A journalist who wants access to information cannot enter private property, take documents without permission, or wiretap a telephone and expect to face no legal consequences. A news organization might decide that some stories are so important they are worth the risk of legal sanctions, but that is a different matter to be decided jointly and carefully by editors, reporters, and management.