According to media law, all media organizations have to present annually their financial data to the designated institution, which is the Ministry of Culture. These data (company names and ownership data) are publicly available on the Internet; hence anyone interested can check and get information on who owns what and how much in the media field. Despite this, lack of public accountability and absence of transparency are among the most serious drawbacks of the Lithuanian media. As mentioned, most of the news media do not have written editorial policies, and if they have – these are not publicly accessible (for example, on the Internet). Among those media that are least transparent are Respublika and Vakaro žinios, which also do not have open editorial policies and an Internet website. As mentioned, another observation is that the mainstream media in Lithuania do not adhere to demands to publish corrections, and if they do publish corrections, they are not in clearly identifiable places. newspapers do not publish their circulation numbers (only magazines audit their circulation).
