First reporting time

The first reporting time on a story is when the development first became publicly known — not when we read it, and not when the latest source was published.

Why it matters

• Prioritization: a same-day first report may still be incomplete; a week-old one usually has stable detail.
• Historical search: first-report time anchors a story’s timeline even as later updates arrive.
• Duplicates: later coverage of an old development never re-triggers “first report” alerts.

What it is not

It is not proof of when an attack happened — intrusions often predate public reporting by months, and stories say so when sources establish it.