11 Apr 2014 Hechelei Bielefeld

BigBrotherAwards 2014

Image:Björn Weis

For Julia and Winston

These BigBrotherAwards are marked by the global surveillance disclosures by Edward Snowden. For his courage, we create a positive award for the first time ever – the “Julia and Winston award” (see “1984”). It is presented by Heribert Prantl, a leading journalist on domestic politics and honorary law professor, and endowed with one million Snowden stickers calling for him to be given asylum rights. These are distribute throughout Germany in the following six months. We’re not abandoning the negative awards, of course: winners include the Federal Chancellery, IT services provider CSC, energy utility corporation RWE, and coach transport company MeinFernbus.

The (unfortunate) Awardees 2014

Bundeskanzler.innenamt von außen bei strahlend blauem Himmel.

Image:Tischbeinahe CC-BY 3.0 Source

Politics (2014)

Federal Chancellery

The German BigBrotherAward in the Politics Category goes to the Federal Chancellery (Bundeskanzleramt) for their involvement in the NSA surveillance scandal and for their lack of defensive and protective action. One of the…

Laudator.in

Dr. Rolf Gössner

Graffiti in schwarz-weiß von Edward Snowdens Augen. Er trägt eine kantige Brille.

Image:thierry ehrmann CC-BY 2.0 Source

Positive Award (2014)

Edward Snowden

For the first time, we introduce a positive award this year. The “Julia and Winston Award” was named after the “rebellious” main characters in George Orwell’s dystopian novel “1984”, from which the “Big Brother”concept is also…

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Heribert Prantl

Image:Lydia Berlin 01 CC-BY-SA 4.0 Source

Transport (2014)

MeinFernbus

The BigBrotherAward 2014 in the category Transport goes to MeinFernbus GmbH (approx.: My Long-Distance Bus, Ltd.) for obliging passengers to always show an official ID along with the travel ticket they booked online. This makes…

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Prof. Dr. Peter Wedde

Point of view: Fahrer.innensitz eines Autos. Stau auf der Straße. Es ist dunkel. Ein Navi leuchtet.

Image:Dominik CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0 Source

Technology (2014)

„Spies in our Cars“

The BigBrotherAward in the “Technology” category goes to the “Spies in our Cars”, which look over our shoulders wherever we drive, collecting data, and sometimes even uploading it to the “cloud”. It is difficult to name a culprit…

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Frank Rosengart

Überwachungsturm mit einer US-Flagge hinter einer Mauer mit Stacheldraht.

Image:Joint Task Force Guantanamo CC-BY-ND 2.0 Source

Business (2014)

CSC

The BigBrotherAward 2014 in the “Business” Category goes to CSC (Computer Sciences Corporation). The company is currently working on commissions by 10 Federal German Ministries on security-related projects, such as the electronic…

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Rena Tangens

Image:Wiki05 Public Domain Source

Workplace (2014)

RWE

The BigBrotherAward 2014 in the Workplace category goes to RWE Vertrieb AG (RWE is Germany’s second-largest energy utility company, and RWE Vertrieb is its sales subsidiary). The company makes subcontractors use a surveillance…

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Sönke Hilbrans

Point of view: Eine Person, die vor einem Fernseher sitzt. Die Fernbedienung in der Hand zeigt Richtung Fernseher. Die Füße sind hochgelegt.

Image:PantherMediaAll rights reserved Source

Consumer Protection (2014)

LG

The South Korean electronics manufacturer LG receives the BigBrotherAward in the Consumer Protection category because the “smart” TV sets they sell transmitted detailed information about what people were watching to the firm’s HQ…

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padeluun

Martin Haase am Redner.innenpult während seiner Laudatio zur Kategorie Neusprech.

Image:Fabian Kurz CC-BY 4.0

Newspeak (2014)

Metadata

We can tell others a lot about ourselves in conversations. What really strips us naked, though, is our metadata. They tell others what we think, plan, and do.

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Kai Biermann Martin Haase

Image:Digitalcourage CC-BY 4.0

Audience Award (2014)

German Chancellery is caught up

In 2014 we continued our tradition of asking our audience which of the awards they regarded as particularly “impressive, surprising, shocking, or outrageous”.