ProPublica hires Dudley to cover tech

ProPublica has hired Renee Dudley as a senior reporter covering the central roles that technology, algorithms and social media play in our lives.

She starts on Aug. 13 and will be based in the Boston area.

Dudley comes to ProPublica from Reuters, where she reported extensively on problems with college entrance exams, uncovering a U.S. college admissions system corrupted by systematic cheating on standardized tests in Asia. Following public outcry over the use of leaked SAT exams and other issues, the test’s maker vowed to fix the problems. The series, Cheat Sheet, was named a 2017 Pulitzer Prize finalist in national reporting.

Before joining Reuters in 2015, Renee worked in New York and Boston for Bloomberg News and in South Carolina for The (Charleston) Post and Courier and The (Hilton Head) Island Packet. At Bloomberg, she uncovered an accounting scandal at Walmart’s China unit and used internal documents to show that the company was unable to keep shelves stocked in the U.S., in part because it had cut 120,000 employees while adding more than 450 new stores.

In Charleston, her reporting on the misuse of campaign funds led to the indictment and resignation of former House Speaker Bobby Harrell, then South Carolina’s most powerful politician. Her state house reporting also made her a persistent thorn in the side of then-Gov. Nikki Haley. She was named South Carolina’s 2011 Journalist of the Year and received the Society of Professional Journalists’ Pulliam Award in 2010 for her work upholding First Amendment rights while reporting for The Island Packet. There, her reporting led to a change in state law that opened public records.

“Renee is a tenacious reporter who has repeatedly landed revelatory stories about abuses of power and forced important issues to the forefront of public debate,” said ProPublica managing editor Robin Fields. “As we expand our efforts to hold the giants of technology accountable, we are excited to welcome her to the ProPublica team.”