We're talking about the CONFESSIONAL here.
For the non-catholic, think "pastoral counseling" or some other form of "private" confessional type of counseling.
A popular way of paying individuals with zero oversight is to use compromised corporations. They maintain a few seats on their board of directors and the selected individuals become a "member" of the board and get paid. The company eats the loss and it's respectable.
I'm not talking about just journos, this is anyone they want to control. Some corporations pay their board members quite well. It's one of those deals that can end with a single phone call.
In addition, it provides the opportunity to rub shoulders with people they never would otherwise.