Big Brother Awards

The Big Brother Awards recognize "the government and private sector organizations ... which have done the most to threaten personal privacy". They are named after the George Orwell character Big Brother from the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. They are awarded yearly to authorities, companies, organisations, and persons that have been acting particularly and consistently to threaten or violate people's privacy, or disclosed people's personal data to third parties.

The awards are intended to draw public attention to privacy issues and related alarming trends in society, especially in data privacy. The contest is organized by a nongovernmental organization "Iuridicum remedium".[1]

The German Big Brother Awards are organised and hosted by digitalcourage (formerly FoeBuD) in Bielefeld.

The United States most recently hosted The Big Brother Awards on April 14th of 2005 in Seattle, WA. They had previously been hosted in Berkeley, CA on April 21, 2004; New York, NY on April 3, 2003; San Francisco, CA on April 18, 2002; and Cambridge on March 7,, 2001.

The first annual US "Big Brother Awards" were made at the Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday 7 April 1999, the 50th anniversary of the publication of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.[2] The awards were made by Simon Davies, managing director[3] of the London-based Privacy International to recognize "the government and private sector organizations which have done the most to invade personal privacy in the United States."[2] The awards, otherwise known as Orwells, were given in five categories: Greatest Corporate Invader, Lifetime Menace, Most Invasive Program, People's Choice, and Worst Public Official.[3]

Countries

The following countries have their own version of the Big Brother Awards:

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Lidská práva, watchdog, advocacy (Aktuality) - Iuridicum Remedium - IuRe".
  2. 1 2 Diederich, Tom (8 April 1999). "Intel, US Govt "honored" for breaches of privacy". Computerworld. Retrieved 25 Jul 2014.
  3. 1 2 Boodhoo, Niala (8 April 1999). "Orwell's Legacy: Big Brother Awards". PC World Today. Retrieved 25 Jul 2014.

External links

Media related to Big Brother Awards at Wikimedia Commons

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