Ownership & Funding
Readers deserve to know who pays for the journalism they read and who is in a position to influence it. This page discloses who owns HackNews, where our money comes from, which relationships could create a conflict, and the structural rules that keep revenue away from editorial decisions.
1. Who owns HackNews
HackNews is the news publication of Hacklido, an independent cybersecurity community and learning platform. It is not a subsidiary of any media group, security vendor, or holding company, and it is not owned in whole or in part by any government, political party, or political organisation.
Ownership is held entirely by the founders named above. There are no silent partners, no beneficial owners outside that group, and no shareholder with the ability to direct editorial coverage. If this changes, this page will be updated before the change takes effect in any way that could affect our journalism.
2. How HackNews is funded
HackNews is funded through the following sources, listed roughly in order of contribution:
- Cybersecurity education and training. The Hacklido team operates paid cybersecurity training programmes, including Techonquer, which covers VAPT, OSCP preparation, SOC, OSINT, cloud security and AI security. Surplus from this work subsidises the newsroom. This is currently our primary funding source.
- Community platform operations. Hacklido's learning platform, labs and CTF environment.
- Founder capital. Direct funding by the founders, including hosting, infrastructure and tooling costs.
- Reader and community support. Voluntary contributions, where offered. These carry no editorial rights of any kind.
Because Techonquer and Hacklido are operated by the same founders who own HackNews, any HackNews article that mentions Techonquer, Hacklido, or an affiliated venture will state that relationship inside the article. We treat our own products with the same scepticism we apply to anyone else's, and we do not review them.
3. Advertising and sponsorship
As of the review date on this page, HackNews carries no programmatic advertising. We removed third-party ad networks from the site deliberately, to keep page performance high and to avoid the tracking that comes bundled with them.
If we introduce advertising or sponsorship in future, these rules apply and this page will be updated first:
- Advertisers receive no advance notice of stories and no ability to review, alter, delay or block coverage.
- Sponsored content is labelled Sponsored at the top of the page, styled distinctly from editorial, excluded from our RSS feed and news sitemap, and marked
rel="sponsored"on outbound links. - No advertiser may purchase placement within, adjacent to, or conditional upon a specific editorial story.
- We do not sell links, guest posts, or "press release publication" in the editorial section, and we decline these requests routinely.
- Affiliate relationships, where they exist, are disclosed in the article and never determine which product is recommended.
4. Separation of revenue and editorial
Because we are a small organisation, the founders necessarily touch both the commercial and editorial sides of the business. We manage that risk with explicit rules rather than pretending the overlap does not exist:
- Commercial conversations never involve a commitment about editorial coverage. If a prospective partner asks for one, we decline the deal.
- Editors are not given revenue targets, traffic-based bonuses, or any incentive tied to a specific story's commercial performance.
- Any story touching a current or prospective commercial partner is disclosed to the reader in the article itself.
- Where an editor has a personal financial interest in a subject, the story is reassigned. Where reassignment is not possible, the interest is disclosed prominently and the reader can judge accordingly.
5. Known conflicts of interest
We publish these standing conflicts so readers can weigh our coverage against them:
| Relationship | Nature of conflict | How we handle it |
|---|---|---|
| Hacklido | Parent community platform, same founders | Disclosed in any article that mentions it. We do not review our own platform. |
| Techonquer | Affiliated cybersecurity training company, same founders; a primary revenue source | Disclosed in any article that mentions it or the training market it operates in. |
| Community contributors | Some contributors work at security vendors | Employer affiliation is disclosed on the article. Contributors do not cover their own employer. |
If you are aware of a conflict we have failed to disclose, tell us at [email protected] and we will investigate and publish the outcome.
6. Editorial control
Final editorial authority rests with the editor named on each article, and ultimately with the co-founders. No external party, including funders, training clients, community partners, or advertisers, holds any right of review or approval over HackNews content prior to publication.
7. Corrections to this disclosure
This page is reviewed at least annually and updated immediately whenever ownership, funding or a material conflict changes. If you believe anything on this page is inaccurate or incomplete, contact us and we will correct it publicly.