More than 81,000 complaints have been filed against several British right-wing newspapers over their coverage of Misan Harriman , the photographer, activist and chair of London's Southbank Centre, in an unprecedented backlash against a "smear campaign".
Following the coverage targeting Harriman, NewsCord , an online platform focused on challenging media bias, launched a campaign enabling users to submit official complaints to the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO).
Users were provided with a personalised complaint template, which was automatically submitted to the regulator after being completed.
"It's an official IPSO complaint that we send on behalf of the user, and we just do it to make it easier, so everyone that complains, they’re aware of the smear campaign and want to take action," Nima Akram, founder of NewsCord, tells The New Arab .
Akram said the complaints concern articles published by the The Telegraph, Daily Mail and Daily Express , all of which fall under IPSO 's jurisdiction.
One article accused Harriman of promoting conspiracy theories surrounding an alleged antisemitic attack in Golders Green after he had questioned why the attacker's first victim, a Muslim man named Ishmail Hussein, was omitted from police reporting.
"NewsCord's interpretation of this is misinformation at its core, because [Harriman's] not sharing a conspiracy, he's simply making a point about why the first victim wasn't reported by the Met [police]," Akram said.
"Our takeaway from that is this was a smear article trying to [damage] his name."
A second article focused on a five-minute video Harriman made following the UK election results. NewsCord found that only 57 seconds of the clip were used and framed in a way that suggested Harriman had compared Reform UK voters to perpetrators of the Holocaust .
The line in question was a quotation from Jewish-American writer Susan Sontag , who argued that 10% of any population is inherently cruel, 10% inherently merciful, and the remaining 80% can be influenced in either direction during moments of crisis, referencing the Holocaust as an example of human behaviour under social pressure.
After the clip circulated, GB News , the Daily Mail and the Daily Express all published headlines claiming the Southbank Centre chief had "compared Reform victory to the Holocaust", using the same edited extract.
Akram argued that the same outlets repeatedly attempted to associate Harriman with antisemitism or conspiracy theories, while also pointing to what he described as antisemitic caricatures published by The Telegraph targeting Green Party politician Zack Polanski .
While GB News falls outside IPSO's jurisdiction as a broadcaster, Akram said NewsCord had still contacted the channel's editor outlining the reasons for its complaint.
NewsCord is calling for the "false framing" of Harriman's video to be retracted and restored to its original context. The group also wants media outlets to acknowledge that Harriman publicly condemned the Golders Green antisemitic attack on the first day, something Akram said all four outlets had omitted.
In a statement shared with The New Arab , Harriman said: "We have reached the point where truth itself is being crushed by the very institutions that are supposed to uphold it. I will never whisper about the oppressed. I stand with truth, I stand by my right to use my voice to help others." Record-breaking complaints campaign As of Thursday, the complaint figures have reached just over 81,000, a figure Akram called "unprecedented".
While IPSO has not confirmed the figure, Akram said it may have surpassed the regulator's previous record for complaints generated by a single article, referring to Jeremy Clarkson's 2022 column in The Sun about Meghan Markle, which prompted more than 25,000 complaints.
"This seems to have broken that record, so it’s unprecedented, and you would think IPSO are obliged to investigate and give us the next steps," Akram said.
The platform is hoping the regulator will launch a formal investigation, issue public corrections, acknowledge that coordinated misinformation requires a systemic regulatory response, and recognise that the volume of public complaints itself constitutes evidence of regulatory failure left unanswered.
When discussing potential outcomes, Akram said IPSO could either take a stand and condemn publications for smearing someone over their political views, or ignore the campaign entirely, which he argued would send "a clear message to the public".
Akram also pointed to a broader pattern among UK regulators, including Ofcom, arguing that NewsCord campaigns against biased coverage by the BBC of Israel's genocide in Gaza have been ignored without outcome.
"We can see that Ofcom is regulated, but only when it suits the status quo and suits its own agenda, whereas there have been perfectly valid complaints that have been sent to Ofcom in the past," he said.
He contrasted this with Ofcom's swift response to chants of "death to the IDF" by punk duo Bob Vylan during Glastonbury, after which the regulator publicly expressed concern to the BBC.
The campaign against Harriman has also prompted a number of prominent figures, including Greta Thunberg , Tracey Emin and Gary Lineker, to sign an open letter in support of the Southbank Centre chair, describing the coverage as a "dishonest smear campaign" by British media outlets.