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This article analyses the digital shutdown experienced in Catalonia within the framework of the independence referendum of 1 October 2017, which had been declared illegal by Spain's Constitutional Court. We question the notion of digital disintermediation and examine how Internet control and blackout processes are not exclusive to authoritarian political systems, but have instead begun to develop in Western democracies in situations of socio-political crisis. We analyse the type of shutdown implemented in Catalonia, the players (both institutional and corporate) taking part in the process, and the resistance strategies implemented by civil society to maintain the flow of digital communications. In our conclusion, we reflect upon the implications of the events that took place in Catalonia for the future of digital sovereignty and suggest further lines of research for monitoring similar shutdown processes.

This article offers a comparative study of three media scandals arising from two types of leaks: official ones (the Monedero Case and the Pujol Case) and those originating from citizens (the Falciani List). Official leaks are carried out by elites and respond to private/partisan interests. Citizens' leaks come from anonymous individuals who deliver huge databases to the media for journalistic treatment. Our objective is to analyse the coverage received by both types of leaks in the Spanish press. The results show the use of official leaks as a political weapon in Polarized Pluralism media systems. Scandals based on citizens' leaks, which refer to transnational problems with greater ramifications, receive less attention. We discuss the extent to which the polarization of conventional political communication has increased and the future of new formats of information based on citizens' digital participation in an emerging Networked Fourth Estate.