About Armando.info

Armando.info

Overview

Armando.info is a Spanish-language digital investigative-journalism site that reports on Venezuela from exile, today based in Bogotá, Colombia. It describes itself as a community of journalists born in Venezuela amid media crisis and censorship, focused on well-documented transnational investigations into money laundering, human rights and environmental issues. It was verifiably operating in October 2026: its homepage, fetched for this research, was headed 24 October 2026 and listed recent investigations, including items on the fallout from the reported handover of businessman Alex Saab to the United States, on properties linked to Saab, and on a special investigation into the looting of the state oil company PDVSA. Its site also carries an English-language section.

Armando.info's exile character is central to its identity and must be stated honestly. Its editors fled Caracas for Bogotá in January 2018 after the businessman Alex Saab sued for defamation, offences carrying up to six years in prison in Venezuela, and the team has since dispersed across Latin American countries, with some members facing legal proceedings or cancelled passports. Unlike several other Venezuelan outlets, it was still listed as blocked inside Venezuela in the September–October 2026 assessments, while others were partially restored. It publishes from outside the country for an audience that includes Venezuelans who cannot freely reach it at home.

History

Armando.info first appeared in 2010 as an early investigative-journalism project and formally launched on Sunday 20 July 2014, as stated on its own "Quienes Somos" page, publishing weekly investigative reports. Its co-founders were Ewald Scharfenberg, Joseph Poliszuk and Roberto Deniz. By August 2017 its own About page counted more than 300 reports. It is a long-term partner of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and has worked on the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers, placing its Venezuelan investigations in a transnational context.

Its defining episode came in late 2017, when it reported how a politically connected businessman inflated prices for food packages for poor citizens under the state CLAP food programme. The reporting is credited with leading to arrests of influential Venezuelans. In early 2018, after Alex Saab sued for defamation, Scharfenberg, Deniz, Poliszuk and a colleague fled Caracas for Bogotá in January 2018, initially working from the offices of the Colombian magazine Semana; a judge then barred them from leaving Venezuela while the case was pending, and a fourth reporter, Alfredo Meza, went to the United States. Legal pressure has continued: a Caracas criminal court issued an arrest warrant for Deniz in 2021 on "inciting hate" charges punishable by up to 20 years, and in 2024 the Venezuelan prosecutor accused the outlet of corruption, an accusation the outlet called an attempt to discredit and silence it. In 2025 the Gabo Foundation gave it its Recognition of Excellence award, shared with journalists from Argentina and Brazil, for courage, rigour and commitment to truth amid disinformation, censorship and attacks on the press, with the tribute specified for its corruption and organised-crime investigations continued even in exile.

Programming and Content

Armando.info's content is long-form investigative journalism in Spanish, with an English section, organised into investigations, specials and series and short video material, including "Armando shorts" on YouTube. Its October 2026 homepage illustrates its agenda: investigations into the Saab affair and its fallout, properties linked to Saab, and the looting of PDVSA. Earlier cited work includes a June 2026 investigation, referenced in a Latin American investigative round-up, reporting that a Venezuelan football federation vice-president appears in Spanish police files as representative or owner of companies used for allegedly fraudulent consulting, and a June 2026 investigation cited in a transparency study into contracts distributed under Delcy Rodríguez.

The outlet's method is documentary investigation: well-sourced, transnational reporting on corruption, money laundering and organised crime, produced in partnership with international investigative networks. Its funding appeal, carried on its October 2026 homepage, states that donations fund its corruption investigations under hostile conditions, with a donation link provided. Other funding sources and any grant breakdown could not be verified and are not asserted. Its content is published without a print edition; the website is the entire operation.

Audience and Reach

No audience or traffic figure for Armando.info from a reliable, dated source was found in this research, and none is asserted. The outlet's reach is best described qualitatively: it is a specialist investigative publication whose influence is measured less by mass readership than by the impact of its investigations — arrests credited to its CLAP reporting, international partnerships, and awards — and by its readership among Venezuelans, Latin American journalists and international audiences following Venezuelan corruption. Its October 2026 homepage, headed 24 October 2026 and carrying multiple current investigations, confirms continued publication, but no traffic figure is offered because none could be sourced.

Access is a further constraint on reach. Unlike other Venezuelan outlets that benefited from the September 2026 partial unblocking, Armando.info was still listed as blocked inside Venezuela in the September–October 2026 assessments. Its audience inside the country therefore reaches it through circumvention, mirrors — it is hosted and mirrored through the secure platform Qurium to resist attacks and censorship — and social distribution, while its diaspora and international audience reads it freely. No audited measurement exists in the sources consulted.

Digital Presence

Armando.info's digital home is armando.info, verified with a homepage headed 24 October 2026. Its X handle, shown on the homepage, is @ArmandoInfo. Its site carries YouTube embeds and shorts, a donations link, and an English-language section. It is hosted and mirrored through Qurium, a secure platform for journalists under attack, which helps it resist censorship and cyberattacks. Newsletter and application details could not be verified and are left unverified.

The outlet's digital presence is deliberately resilient: a website mirrored through a secure host, social distribution through X and YouTube, and an English section for international readers. That resilience is a practical necessity for an exiled newsroom whose site remains blocked in its home country and whose journalists face arrest warrants and legal proceedings.

Ownership and Organisation

Armando.info describes itself as a community of journalists born in Venezuela amid media crisis and censorship. Its legal owner could not be verified and is not asserted. Its editor-in-chief and co-founder is Joseph Poliszuk, and its founding editor is Ewald Scharfenberg; Roberto Deniz is shown on the October 2026 homepage as an editor making recommendations and is described elsewhere as an editor who fled with colleagues in 2018. No separate current director title was supported by the sources, and none is asserted beyond the editor-in-chief and founding-editor roles. Poliszuk received the International Center for Journalists' Knight International Journalism Award in 2018.

The organisation today is a dispersed exiled newsroom: founded in Caracas, driven to Bogotá in 2018, and since dispersed across Latin American countries, with members facing legal proceedings or cancelled passports. It works in long-term partnership with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and publishes from outside Venezuela for a Venezuelan and international audience. Its 2025 Gabo Recognition of Excellence award, shared with journalists from Argentina and Brazil, recognises exactly that condition: corruption and organised-crime investigations continued even in exile.

Contact and Availability

Armando.info is available online at armando.info, with an English-language section, X at @ArmandoInfo, and YouTube shorts as additional channels. It is a digital-only investigative site with no print edition. Readers inside Venezuela should be aware that the site was still listed as blocked in the September–October 2026 assessments, unlike several other Venezuelan outlets that were partially restored, and may require circumvention tools or mirrors to reach. No verified street address, telephone number or public contact email for the outlet was published in the sources consulted for this profile, so none is printed, and this directory's public business-email field is left empty. Donations, which the outlet says fund its investigations, are invited through the link on its homepage, and other enquiries are best directed through the website's own contact channels.