by Rowan Philp • December 15, 2025
Reflecting a year in which both kleptocracy and attacks on independent media have increased worldwide, investigative reporters harnessed collaboration, courage, traditional reporting, and a mix of new and established digital tools to hold bad actors accountable.
Many complex investigations gather leads and data through a blend of custom and open source tools. One example from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) this year was how their team partnered with experts to create a machine learning-based detection tool, and used this with its open source Datashare platform to automatically identify passport information from millions of leaked records.
For 2025, we highlight some new or underused tools that aren’t necessarily the most powerful in their sector, but that focus on real-world problems investigative reporters encounter on their beats.
But GIJN’s annual Top Tools lists seek to highlight innovative, individual tools that don’t require advanced computer science skills and address topical needs.
Last year, the list featured a master toolkit from Bellingcat that updates reporters on the status of open source tools; a remarkable new portal that reveals munition types from fragments found near bomb craters; and a tool that can spare reporters from having to trawl through bigoted far-right content by automatically pulling data from fringe social media platforms.
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