But they have no big influence, they just play the courtjester to a forever demented king.
Thou it would be worse without a jester
And it is in this sense kind of a smart move if you do not want to pay for a lawyer and there is no bug bounty program with T&Cs: journalists can protect their sources. However, you then somehow need to make sure that they waive potential hacking charges. Funnily in the quoted case one of the reasons for the fines was damages related to involving the press.
> journalists can protect their sources.
But in this case not. He must have been pretty worried about German lawyers and courts, which decided really strange lately.
Wouldn't it be even more dangerous to report them to a journalist?