COURT REPORTERS’ UNDERSTANDING ON THE CODE OF ETHICS IN NEWS REPORTING

Journalism, as any professional field, is trusted to be guided by code of ethics (COE). In Malaysia, journalists have their own Canons of Journalism. The aim of this study is to determine the reporters’ understanding on the practice of code of ethics in reporting news. Using a case study approach, the research was conducted at the Kuala Lumpur court complex. Qualitative method was employed to obtain the data. Fifteen court reporters from the English and Malay newspaper’s media organizations were interviewed in-depth to gather data for this study. Finding shows that most of the informants have various understanding over COE in carrying out their reporting work every day. To them, ethics is more to do with principles or guidelines concerning the rights and wrongs of human conduct, and thus, failure to follow the practice of COE in reporting news may have an impact on the reputation of the reporters, media organization and credibility.