The Rhode Island Newsman's Privilege Act provides (emphasis added):

Except as provided in § 9-19.1-3, no person shall be required by any court, grand jury, agency, department, or commission of the state to reveal confidential association, to disclose any confidential information, or to disclose the source of any confidential information received or obtained by him or her in his or her capacity as a reporter, editor, commentator, journalist, writer, correspondent, newsphotographer, or other person directly engaged in the gathering or presentation of news for any accredited newspaper, periodical, press association, newspaper syndicate, wire service, or radio or television station.

What could "accredited" possibly mean here? (And, no, this is not a normal locution in such statutes.)

UPDATE: Just to make it clear, I realize that reporters are sometimes given credentials to access some government event or function, for instance to participate in White House press conferences, get seating in the Supreme Court's press gallery, or get an office in the Supreme Court press room. That's necessary to ration scarce space or time, and sometimes also to provide adequate security. But it's done by each government entity, and doesn't provide any sort of general "accreditation" of a newspaper; a newspaper may have access to White House press briefings but not an office in the Supreme Court, and some newspapers and periodicals that don't specialize in hot news may not seek credentials for access to any government function. There's no reason to think that this sort of case-by-case credentialing for access to particular government functions would bear on whether the newspaper's employees get an evidentiary privilege as to stories that had nothing to do with such government functions.