Only those living under a stone could have missed the global fallout from the release of the Panama Papers, a massive expose of offshore tax havens and the rich who have exploited them for decades.
But less is known of the work which went into their publication, and the relatively-new concept of collaboration which made it possible.
Based on a leak to respected German newspaper Suddeutscher Zeitung, the Panama Papers took a year to investigate, and collect and research made up of more than 11 million files.
"The impact is still being felt today, two years after publication," says Scilla Alecci of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, and one of two journalists leading a masterclass during WAN-Ifra's Publish Asia conference.
Substantial teams of journalists worked on the project in many parts of the world, and the Pulitizer Prize won for the story "goes to the almost 400 journalists from around the world who contributed," she says.
Scilla Alecci also described the Paradise Papers, published in November 2017, using less data but a bigger number of sources and more than 300 journalists in collaboration to expose the murky world of off-shore finance.
Alecci and fellow speaker Wahyu Dhyatmika, an investigative reporter and editor from Indonesia's Tempo Media Group, told a highly-engaged masterclass audience of more such collaborations, including several closer to home and lower profile. Among them, 'Slavery at sea' told the story of the deaths of Indonesian fisherman on Taiwanese trawlers, and was the result of a collaboration between Tempo and Taiwan's The Reporter.
Tempo and MalaysiaKini had also collaborated on an important story on human trafficking to Malaysia, and Wahyu Dhyatmika told of the many lessons learned, focussing on communication, trust and security as major issues.
The masterclass in collaborative investigative journalism preceded the Publish Asia conference, and attracted a roomful of "journalists who wanted to learn" from all over southeast Asia and India, most from cultures described as "having no tradition in investigative journalism".
With several participants saying they were accustomed to regard fellow media in home countries as "the competition", Wahyu Dhyatmika urged them to see collaboration as "the new thing, the new buzzword" and discover that the best way to learn is by doing. "There are many reasons why collaboration can be much more effective that a story produced by a single newsroom," he said.
A major issue was cross border participation, making a story much stronger when it includes issues from different countries: "The impact is much wider if the story comes from say, newsrooms in Indonesia and Malaysia, with readers and response from government in both countries.
"You can change things if you publish stories with a greater impact and, incidentally, build your own brand and subscribers," Dhyatmika added.
A great story could be produced more efficiently by working with someone who knows the country, rather than sending a team in, and it was also good to share the risks of post publication problems across a greater number of collaborators.
That said, "it is vital to remember that you are still responsible for the story you publish, and you have not lost the scoop by ensuring that you and your collaborators publish the story at an agreed date and time."
Trust and respect for the other company's team and communication between the parties is vital: "You can work together without hurting anyone's independence but it is crucial that you know your partner - it's like a marriage - have the same ethics, and a similar interest in the story, with full communication the key," he said.
Italian-born and now based in Washington where she is also coordinator for Asia partnerships for the ICIJ, Scilla Alecci said its 200 members in 65 countries shared a mission in telling globally significant stories. "We do traditional reporting with a big data component," she said. " We have questions to ask before tackling any project, including if it is of global importance, are systems broken and can we expect to get any results?
Both the Panama Papers - published in April 2016 after a year of investigations and still resonating - and the Paradise Papers (published in November 2017) needed huge teams of international journalists, a huge amount of data and many sources. Findings were shared with everyone involved, and we had to decide a publication strategy, with timing down to the day, hours and minute.
The two speakers work closely together and are agreed that source security and that of individual journalists is vital and "no one story framework suits all". Vetting partners and building trust - the key to a successful collaboration - is one of the harder tasks.
Journalists and individual members meet at conferences such as the biannual Uncovering Asia event to be held in Seoul in October, but Dhyatmika and Alecci say some countries are more difficult than others to establish partnerships.
"Security is vital," says Alecci. "Cybersecurity is the first line of defence, with powerful tools in the hands of governments and major companies. You must protect your sources, your brand and yourself.
"Establish what the threat is, work out what are the practical and safe strategies, and constantly evaluate your risk. There are a range of different tools including encryption of emails and messaging apps, but you must know how to move and store files safely, and how to communicate with collaborators in your own country or another. Remember that, just as when you leave your house, you lock the door, the same applies to your communications."
And in case the 'cloak and dagger' warnings might seem over the top, one delegate reported that she and her colleagues were watched so carefully by the government that they used codes and body language to communicate.
An uncomfortable reminder of the necessity for security, and tools needed to achieve it.
Locking the door on digital information
• Use secure chat sites such as Signal and Wire for communication, along with audio chat apps like jig.si to facilitate regular meetings.
• For secure messaging, Whatsapp and Signal erase data afterwards, says Alecci, and "consider using Telegram".
• Encrypt emails using Mailvelope or GPG Chain for Macs, "but beware encrypting everything" as this can lead to chaos and timewasting.
• Be careful with subject lines in emails as these can be a giveaway: "Make it neutral or vague, and look at Protonmail".
• Other tools, such as Google Translate, Dropbox and Tableau, "are very useful but may not be secure". Alecci advocates remembering who owns the data and the storage.
• Veracrypt software to store files safely, "SpiderOak instead of Dropbox", and the Keybase file system Jungle Disk to store in the cloud.
• For your network, Tor or a VPN service such as HideMyAss "is good", with Lastpass as a password manager.
"Do not talk on sensitive topics on the phone or Skype, consider using the old- fashioned postal system to mail files and materials, and use another phone or computer to verify material," says Alecci.
• The ICIJ has a page on its site, www.icij.org/ on ways to communicate.
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