FOTP 2013 Full Report

years. After Autórádió’s bid was disqualified by a court decision in March 2012, several courtsruled in favor of Klubrádió, but the station had yet to regain control of its main frequency atyear’s end.In June 2012, the European Commission referred Hungary to the European Court ofJustice over the questionable independence of its new data protection authority, created by a newconstitution enacted in April 2011 and in operation since January 2012. The commissioner of theprevious data protection body was removed before the end of his term, and the leader of the newauthority is appointed by the president on the recommendation of the prime minister. Originally,this official was subject to dismissal by the prime minister or president on arbitrary grounds, butthat provision was revoked by the parliament in April 2012.The government has made some specific attempts to regulate online media. Under anamendment to the criminal code proposed at the end of 2012, websites deemed by the NMHH tocontain criminal content—such as child pornography—or content that incites criminal activitywould be placed on a blacklist via court order, and internet service providers (ISPs) would becompelled to block the sites. The amendment allows the government to take action if ISPs fail toheed the blocking orders.Hungary enjoys a broad array of print, broadcast, and online media. Most outlets appearto identify with one or the other side of the political spectrum. The media landscape is dominatedby private companies, with high levels of foreign investment in national and local newspapers.Privately held newspapers include 10 national and 24 local dailies. Hungary has five nationalpublic radio stations and two main private stations. Thanks to the activities of a small number ofaffluent Fidesz-aligned businesspeople, there has been a significant growth in the number ofconservative or right-wing media in recent years. With a portfolio that includes print andbroadcast elements as well as Hungary’s biggest outdoor advertisement company, four suchindividuals owning 15 companies saw the aggregate profits of their media empire increasesevenfold in 2011 compared with 2009.The tabloidization of Hungarian broadcast media remains a major concern and hassometimes been used by the government to justify new restrictions on content. Thenongovernmental organization Nyilvánosság Klub (Openness Club) monitored several publicand private television and radio stations between November 7 and December 16, 2011, findingthat just 23 percent of coverage in this period was devoted to international news, compared with32 percent in 2007. The study also found that serious political coverage on public television haddecreased by 30 percent since 2007. During the six weeks that Nyilvánosság Klub monitored thestate-run Hungarian Television (MTV) and Hungarian Radio (MR), they aired only twomentions of foreign criticism of the government. Among all the stations monitored, the onlybroadcasters that were regularly critical of Fidesz were ATV, a commercial cable televisionstation, and the embattled Klubrádió.In 2011, the government-funded news agency MTI became the official source for allpublic media news content. It publishes nearly all of its news and photographs online for free,and offers media service providers the ability to download and republish them. Paid-subscriptionnews agencies and smaller media outlets with limited resources cannot compete with MTI, andthe incentive to practice “copy-and-paste journalism” is high. The accuracy and objectivity ofMTI reporting has come under criticism since the Orbán government came to power in 2010.State and state-dependent advertisers usually buy space in progovernment media, and manyprivate companies have followed suit.199