BBC News facts for kids
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Digital logo from 2022
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| BBC department | |
| Industry | Broadcast media |
| Founded | 14 November 1922 |
| Headquarters | BBC Television Centre (1969–2013) Broadcasting House (2012–present), , |
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Area served
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Specific services for United Kingdom and rest of world |
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Key people
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| Services | Radio, internet, and television broadcasts |
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Number of employees
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3,500 (2,000 journalists) |
| Parent | BBC |
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online news coverage. The service maintains 50 foreign news bureaus with more than 250 correspondents around the world. Deborah Turness has been the CEO of news and current affairs since September 2022.
In 2019, it was reported in an Ofcom report that the BBC spent £136m on news during the period April 2018 to March 2019. BBC News' domestic, global and online news divisions are housed within the largest live newsroom in Europe, in Broadcasting House in central London. Parliamentary coverage is produced and broadcast from studios in London. Through BBC English Regions, the BBC also has regional centres across England and national news centres in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. All nations and English regions produce their own local news programmes and other current affairs and sport programmes.
The BBC is a quasi-autonomous corporation authorised by royal charter, making it operationally independent of the government.
Contents
Broadcasting media
Television
BBC News is responsible for the news programmes and documentary content on the BBC's general television channels, as well as the news coverage on the BBC News Channel in the UK, and 22 hours of programming for the corporation's international BBC World News channel. Coverage for BBC Parliament is carried out on behalf of the BBC at Millbank Studios, though BBC News provides editorial and journalistic content. BBC News content is also output onto the BBC's digital interactive television services under the BBC Red Button brand, and until 2012, on the Ceefax teletext system.
The music on all BBC television news programmes was introduced in 1999 and composed by David Lowe. It was part of the re-branding which commenced in 1999 and features 'BBC Pips'. The general theme was used on bulletins on BBC One, News 24, BBC World and local news programmes in the BBC's Nations and Regions. Lowe was also responsible for the music on Radio One's Newsbeat. The theme has had several changes since 1999, the latest in March 2013.
The BBC Arabic Television news channel launched on 11 March 2008, a Persian-language channel followed on 14 January 2009, broadcasting from the Peel wing of Broadcasting House; both include news, analysis, interviews, sports and highly cultural programmes and are run by the BBC World Service and funded from a grant-in-aid from the British Foreign Office (and not the television licence).
Radio
BBC Radio News produces bulletins for the BBC's national radio stations and provides content for local BBC radio stations via the General News Service (GNS), a BBC-internal news distribution service. BBC News does not produce the BBC's regional news bulletins, which are produced individually by the BBC nations and regions themselves. The BBC World Service broadcasts to some 150 million people in English as well as 27 languages across the globe. BBC Radio News is a patron of the Radio Academy.
Online
BBC News Online is the BBC's news website. Launched in November 1997, it is one of the most popular news websites, with 1.2 billion website visits in April 2021, as well as being used by 60% of the UK's internet users for news. The website contains international news coverage as well as entertainment, sport, science, and political news.
Mobile apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone systems have been provided since 2010. Many television and radio programmes are also available to view on the BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds services. The BBC News channel is also available to view 24 hours a day, while video and radio clips are also available within online news articles.
In October 2019, BBC News Online launched a mirror on the dark web anonymity network Tor in an effort to circumvent censorship.
Partners
BBC and ABC share video segments and reporters as needed in producing their newscasts. with the BBC showing ABC World News Tonight with David Muir in the UK. However, in July 2017, BBC announced a new partnership with CBS News allows both organisations to share video, editorial content, and additional newsgathering resources in New York, London, Washington and around the world.
BBC News subscribes to wire services from leading international agencies including PA Media (formerly Press Association), Reuters, and Agence France-Presse. In April 2017, the BBC dropped Associated Press in favour of an enhanced service from AFP.
The view of foreign governments
BBC News reporters and broadcasts are now and have in the past been banned in several countries primarily for reporting which has been unfavourable to the ruling government. For example, correspondents were banned by the former apartheid régime of South Africa. The BBC was banned in Zimbabwe under Mugabe for eight years as a terrorist organisation until being allowed to operate again over a year after the 2008 elections.
The BBC was banned in Burma (officially Myanmar) after their coverage and commentary on anti-government protests there in September 2007. The ban was lifted four years later in September 2011. Other cases have included Uzbekistan, China, and Pakistan. BBC Persian, the BBC's Persian language news site, was blocked from the Iranian internet in 2006. The BBC News website was made available in China again in March 2008, but as of October 2014[update], was blocked again.
In June 2015, the Rwandan government placed an indefinite ban on BBC broadcasts following the airing of a controversial documentary regarding the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Rwanda's Untold Story, broadcast on BBC2 on 1 October 2014. The UK's Foreign Office recognised "the hurt caused in Rwanda by some parts of the documentary".
In February 2017, reporters from the BBC (as well as the Daily Mail, The New York Times, Politico, CNN, and others) were denied access to a United States White House briefing.
In 2017, BBC India was banned for a period of 5 years from covering all national parks and sanctuaries in India. Following the withdrawal of CGTN's UK broadcaster licence on 4 February 2021 by Ofcom, China banned BBC News from airing in China.
Images for kids
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Television News moved to BBC Television Centre in September 1969.
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Angela Rippon, pictured in 1983, became the first female news presenter in 1975.
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The combined newsroom for domestic television and radio was opened at Television Centre in West London in 1998.
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The new newsroom in Broadcasting House
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Logo used from 2019 to 2022
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See also
In Spanish: BBC News para niños
