[6] In December 2017, Ismayilova received the Right Livelihood Award, often referred to as "Alternative Nobel Prize", "for her courage and tenacity in exposing corruption at the highest levels of government through outstanding investigative journalism in the name of transparency and accountability.

[9] From 1997 to 2007, she worked as a journalist for a number of local and foreign media outlets, including the newspaper Zerkalo, Caspian Business News and the Azerbaijani edition of the Voice of America.

Following the March 2010 publication of a Washington Post article, which used Ismayilova's work as background information, that the eleven-year-old son of Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev owned real estate in the United Arab Emirates worth 44 million USD,[12] Ismayilova co-published an article based on her investigation which shed light on the business activity of other members of the President's family and the family's close circle of friends.

It also claimed that the mobile operator had been falsely naming Siemens as its legal owner in order to be able to participate in state tenders to evade the Azerbaijani law not allowing newly registered companies to do so.

[17] Opposition member Ilgar Mammadov also linked the adoption of the amendments to the corruption scandal caused by the reports and said it would turn Azerbaijan itself into a corruption-friendly offshore zone.

[20] According to a Freedom House report, Azerbaijani law prohibits government officials, including the president, from owning businesses, but there are no such restrictions on family members.

[21] In the report, Ismayilova quoted Vasif Movsumov, executive director of the Baku-based Anti-Corruption Foundation, as saying the ownership of the said companies by Parliament Members is a violation of law.

[20] In a 2011 interview to Gunaz TV, Khadija Ismayilova said she believed that Islamists affiliated with Iran's intelligence were directly responsible for the assassination of publicist Rafiq Tağı.

[22] Ismayilova condemned the murder of Gurgen Margaryan by Azerbaijani officer Ramil Safarov by calling it an "awful act" and said unlike some, she did not consider him a hero.

She also criticised President Aliyev for not exercising his right to pardon a convicted criminal in the proper manner, which made Azerbaijan an easy target of criticism by the international community.

[25] On 7 March 2012, Ismayilova received what appeared to be snapshots of a footage from a camera hidden in her bedroom capturing her engaged in sexual intercourse with her boyfriend.

Ismayilova blamed the government, primarily the Presidential Administration, for ordering her sex-taped and launching a smear campaign to retaliate for her investigative activity.

In her letter to President Ilham Aliyev, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Dunja Mijatović insisted that those responsible for the blackmail be identified and prosecuted.

[31] In April 2012, British pop singer Sandie Shaw joined an Amnesty International campaign to end human rights abuses in Azerbaijan.

[34] A number of international human rights organisations signed a collective letter addressed to President Ilham Aliyev and Attorney General Zakir Garalov, calling on them to ensure proper investigation in order to put an end to the ongoing smear campaign against Khadija Ismayilova and have its perpetrators punished.

[39] On 15 August 2013, the Binagadi Court of Appeal upheld the previous decision, after which Ismayilova stated she would only perform community service in public, out of fear for her safety.

[40] An article published on 13 February 2014 on a pro-government website accused Ismayilova of passing along information discrediting members of Azerbaijan's political opposition to two U.S. congressional staffers who were in Baku, allegedly to gather intelligence.

[45] Ismayilova was notified that the authorities would be waiting for her to return to Baku on October 3,[46] and while she was detained for five hours, with a focus on a camera SD card possibly containing documents against the state, later found empty, she was not arrested.

[54] Some note that her arrest came one day after the head of the Presidential Administration of Azerbaijan Republic, Ramiz Mehdiyev published a manifesto in which Ismayilova was named "the best example" of journalists working against the government.

"She puts on anti-Azerbaijani shows, makes absurd statements, openly demonstrates a destructive attitude towards well-known members of the Azerbaijani community, and spreads insulting lies" and accused Ismayilova of treason.

He denied being pressured by a third party into filing it, but did briefly mention that he was "detained" back in December soon after leaving a message on his Facebook page in which he expressed his intent to withdraw the complaint.

She had previously filed a case with the European Court of Human Rights stating that she had been held in prison beyond the pre-trial detention of two months following her December 2014 arrest.

[84] According to peer-reviewed journal Caucasus Survey, due to the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, the authoritarian Azerbaijani leadership has garnered high degrees of social solidarity for the first time since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991—including from its "most vicious critics".