Deborah Turness

Early life and education Born in Meriden, Solihull, England, Turness was educated at St Francis' College (aged twelve, expelled by the Sisters for kissing a boy behind a bush); then The Knights Templar School in Baldock, Hertfordshire. Turness took a BA in French and English from the University of Surrey; She became ITN's North of England producer in 1991. In 1993, she joined the ITN Bureau in Washington as a producer.

In 2000, Turness was Deputy Editor of 5 News before being promoted to Editor in 2002. At Five News she famously did away with desks in the studio, thereby introducing the concept of "perching presenters". In 2004, she became the Editor of ITV News, being the first woman to become the head of network news. ITV News won three consecutive Baftas and an International Emmy during her tenure. In 2008, Turness won "The News and Factual Award" presented by Women in Television and Film. Also in 2008, she was the co-winner of an Amnesty International UK Media Awards for the television news report "Too Young to Die – Children of the Frontline". In 2010, she chaired the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival. In response to the Brian Williams controversy over his misleading statements, Turness was criticised heavily. Vanity Fair reported that several NBC News executives were displeased at her work and felt she was not qualified to do the job.

In February 2017, Noah Oppenheim took over as president of NBC News and Turness was appointed president of a new division called NBC News International that was NBC's side in a partnership with Euronews, in which each network would contribute reporting to the other. She moved back to the UK. Turness was prevented from taking up the post immediately as her employer, ITN, denied her early release from her notice period. The then director-general of the BBC, Tim Davie, said that the then Deputy Director of News, Jonathan Munro, would hold the post "until Deborah Turness joins us later this year". She joined the BBC Board in September 2022 for a two-year term, with Munro as her deputy.

In 2023, Turness launched the BBC's Verify fact-checking unit. Later that year, a former BBC News chief publicly expressed anxieties about Verify. The Daily Telegraph reported her as describing the Reform Party as "an extreme conservative movement, very anti-immigration......" and that it had been BBC editorial policy not to give Nigel Farage prime-time exposure in the last General Election. She dismissed the open-bias scandal of the editing of what Donald Trump had actually said as "a problem with the edit".

Personal life Turness lived in Shepherd's Bush, London, with her first husband, the television journalist Damien Steward.