But you've changed what is conveyed in every case.

(1) You told the reader there was a singular perpetrator.

(2) You repeated "news", making the sentence redundant (objectively) and clunky (my opinion); and you excluded other mediums through which news is transmitted (e.g. the-social-media-service-formerly-known-as-Twitter).

(3) You centered the army. Brian centered the horses. He explained that this was the point--center the horses!

So I'm not convinced. Of course you can write a more engaging active-voice text that has different meaning, but sometimes the desired meaning should have primacy.

(Sometimes it doesn't matter what you mean as much as it matters how engaging your text is--and then, sure, just don't mean to say anything that can't be said well with active voice.)