Privacy and civil liberty activists across Europe have presented their Big Brother Awards to governments, companies and persons that have excelled in violating the right to privacy. In a weeks period Award ceremonies were held in Germany (24 October), Spain (25 October), Austria (26 October) and Switzerland (1 November).
In Germany prices went to German Post-Shop, part of the Post Office, for pressing their workers to agree that there is no confidentiality between the worker and their doctor when they report sick from work. The German cash-and-carry chain Metro deserved an Award for introducing RFIDs in some of their shops and Berlins Senator of the Interior Körting got one for sending 'silent' SMS messages over the mobile telephony network in order to track and trace GSM users, a practice referred to as 'pinging'.
In Spain Awards were given to the Ministry of Science and Technology for introducing the first mandatory data retention law in Europe. The PriceWaterhouseCoopers lawyer Ribas was honoured with two Awards, both from the jury and the public, for threatening to sue all peer-to-peer users in Spain. Microsoft was awarded for developing Palladium, their future DRM-based operating system.
The Austrian Big Brother Awards were equally divided between domestic and European price winners. Some of the winners are the European Commission for their draft Intellectual Property Enforcement Directive and the European Patent Bureau for awarding patents to ideas and methods in information technology. Just as in Germany the Post was awarded, here for selling addresses to direct marketing firms from people that request forwarding of their post after changing their residential address.
One of the Swiss Awards went to examining magistrate Treccani from Lausanne who ordered mobile telephony companies to hand over all traffic data from specific base stations. Another was given to the Swiss Ministry of Defence for asking recruits privacy sensitive questions such as their sexual preference.
In Switzerland and Spain defenders of privacy were honoured with a positive award. In Switzerland Rebekka Salome, a customer of the insurance company Winterthur, was awarded for revealing the existence of a secret customers database and activist Daniel Costantino for making public the privacy invading recruit question lists of the Swiss Defence Ministry. In Spain a positive Award went to Proinnova, a group opposing the EU patent directive.
Since Privacy International presented the first Big Brother Awards in 1998, an international tradition has begun. By now, more than 45 ceremonies have taken place in 15 different countries.
Big Brother Awards Germany
http://www.big-brother-award.de/en/2003/
Big Brother Awards Spain
http://www.bigbrotherawards-es.org/
Big Brother Awards Austria
http://www.bigbrotherawards.at/2003/nominees/winners_2003.php
Big Brother Awards Switzerland
http://www.bigbrotherawards.ch/