To tell or not to tell?

When embedded reporters in war zones are kidnapped, their employers try to persuade other news outlets not to print the kidnapping. In the case of Richard Engel's abduction, Gawker ran the story against the wishes of NBC. They believe that media attention may increase the risk of the kidnappers harming the reporter. How true is this? Is it ethical for news outlets to persuade others not to run the story?

Gawker writer John Cook received both negative and positive responses from journalists concerning the story. Gawker published the first set of responses in the first installment of their series about the kidnapping. Most of the critics lambasted Gawker's decision, bringing its journalistic integrity into question. Despite its lack of knowledge of Engel's exact circumstances, NBC requested that Gawker not publish the story. Cook responded:

Under those circumstances, no one at NBC made a case to me that reporting Engel's  situation might cause anything concrete to happen to him, because they didn't know anything about his current circumstances.

NBC could not make the case that reporting Engel's situation would cause any harm to him. How could they if they did not know his exact circumstances?  Given that the news had already been reported  internationally and domestically, Cook saw no reason not to report it. He states, "I didn't see a compelling reason to not do what Gawker normally tries to do, which is (among other things) publish true, newsworthy information. 

Fare enough. I'll give him that his journalistic integrity was in the right place. Cook did not allow NBC to strong arm  him into censoring information that they could not give a concrete reason not to censor.

 Not all feedback was negative. Gawker published one positive response to Cook's decision in "Fifteen Ways of Looking at the Media Blackout of Richard Engel's Abduction, Vol. II: Against".  

 I'm not sure what I would have done in that situation. Gawker's choice was ballsy and risky. Why was it risky?  Gawker *may* have put Engel's life at risk. We're not quite sure about that. NBC may have been blowing smoke up our asses. Second, Gawker risked its credibility with its more journalistically saavy readership. That was Gawker's call. Sometimes news outlets must make those risks to report worthy news.  I want to point out to my fellow journalism students that the situation Gawker faces is one that we may face in our careers as journalists. 

I agree with Gawker's decision to publish the story. They weren't the first the break the news here. A Turkish news outlet was one of the first to publish news of Engel's kidnapping. Also, a Chinese newswire Xinhua and Breitbart republished the story. 

Gawker's original posting of Engel's kidnapping can be found here.