In yet another challenge to press freedom in Hong Kong, government authorities have targeted numerous independent media outlets with simultaneous tax audits. Chairperson of the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) Selina Cheng shared the news in a press conference on Wednesday. The Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP), which is one of the organizations caught up in the inspection, reported on the wide range of targets, including family members of journalists:

Hong Kong’s independent news sector, including companies, staff and family members, are facing simultaneous tax audits and backdated demands, the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) said on Wednesday. The situation reflected a worsening press freedom environment, they said.

Head of the HKJA Selina Cheng said at a press conference that at least six news outlets – including InMedia, The Witness, ReNews, Boomhead, Hong Kong Free Press and an outlet that declined to be named – had been receiving government tax demands since November 2023 as part of Inland Revenue Department (IRD) inspections.

Meanwhile, a total of 20 individuals linked to the independent media industry are also facing similar probes and tax demands, Cheng said.

According to the press union, 12 of them are heads, board members or shareholders of the news outlets concerned. Also under inspection are two freelance journalists, two spouses of news outlet heads, an employee of a media outlet, and both parents of the HKJA chief. [Source]

The Inland Revenue Department accused the targeted outlets and individuals of failing to properly report their income and issued backdated tax demands, according to Cheng, who called the claims “unreasonable” and lacking sufficient evidence. The HKFP released a statement saying it "has always met its tax obligations, paid IRD demands immediately, and ensured meticulous record-keeping," and questioned whether the government inspections were an appropriate use of the tax office resources. The statement noted that handling the audit "has diverted resources, manpower and funds away from journalism as we face a fourth year of financial deficit." RFA highlighted Cheng’s claim that there are numerous errors in the government audits:

“For small outlets like ours, this is a serious reputational attack. Being accused of tax evasion is defamation. The authorities’ frequent scrutiny of journalists and media organizations creates anxiety and casts a shadow over press freedom in Hong Kong,” Selina Cheng, the association’s chair, told a news conference.

[…] Cheng said audits are riddled with errors and irregularities. Examples include demands to pay profit tax for years before a company was established; assigning business registration numbers to individuals without any registered business; and incorrectly treating all bank deposits as taxable income. In some cases, people were audited as spouses although they were not married at the time, or as dependents despite not claiming any allowances.

Cheng said the revenue department was imposing “preemptive penalties without due process.” She said many journalists have limited incomes and resources to defend themselves. [Source]

“Press freedom not only means the ability for media and journalists to operate safely, physically … It also means the business environment, whether it is sustainable for them to operate,” said Cheng. (Part of what led Apple Daily to close down in 2021, in addition to the arrests of its executives, was the government’s decision to freeze the company’s bank accounts.) As Tiffany May reported for The New York Times, the disruptive impact of these official investigations appears part of an intentional strategy:

Thomas Kellogg, the executive director of the Georgetown Center for Asian Law, said that administrative harassment can be an effective way to keep in line the remaining outlets that have managed not to cross red lines that could put them at risk for prosecution under national security or sedition laws. Such reviews “serve as a reminder to media outlets that they have to watch what they say, and that the government has ways to hit back at them over reporting it doesn’t like,” he said.

Damon Wong, the director and editor in chief of InMedia, said that a tax investigation into the independent news outlet had caused it to use up significant time and resources. In 2024, he appeared in court and paid a fine of about $1,250 for failing to keep a physical copy of the company registry in its office.

Tom Grundy, the founder of the Hong Kong Free Press, an English-language online outlet, also said that it has had to redirect time, resources and money away from covering the news as it faced scrutiny from the tax and other departments.

Last year, the authorities investigated what the outlet described as “false complaints,” including claims that a hot sauce it sold as a fund-raiser had come from an unlicensed food factory and that Mr. Grundy’s pet dog lacked a license and rabies shot. Both cases were closed after he submitted evidence to the contrary, Mr. Grundy said. [Source]

Last September, the HKJA revealed a “systematic and organized attack” against reporters from at least 13 local media outlets. This harassment campaign included death threats and defamatory content sent to journalists’ home addresses, as well as threats to 15 journalists’ family members, landlords, and employers. The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Hong Kong’s Press Freedom Survey for 2025 also found that 12 of its members had experienced interference in their work over the past 18 months. Partly as a result of these trends, the 2025 World Press Freedom Index published earlier this month listed Hong Kong in the “red zone” for the first time as it dropped to a historic low score. On Press Freedom Day earlier this month, the HKJA launched a project called Media 360, which has a comprehensive timeline of press-freedom events between 2021 and 2025, along with a list of 49 journalists who have been arrested and dozens of emerging media outlets covering Hong Kong.