On 13 April 2005 EDRI-member Isoc Bulgaria organised its second Big Brother Award Ceremony. This years winner in the category of most heinous political institution was the Council of Ministers, for changing the Data Protection Act. Data protection was used as an excuse to block access to personal data of public figures, including politicians.

The individual Bulgarian who most excelled in violating privacy rights was the Chief Prosecutor, for starting an investigation against the journalists who created the BBC television report 'To Win The Games', about alleged bribery for the 2012 Olympic Games city selection. Two journalists posing as businessmen talked to the Bulgarian Member of the International Olympic Committee (Ivan Slavkov) and offered him money if he'd vote for London. The 'prize' also goes to the Appeal prosecution office of the city of Plovdiv for requesting the social security numbers of all cybercafe visitors in the city, and demanding detailed records about the time they accessed the Internet.

Finally the television producers of the program 'SIA Advertising' were put in the icecold spotlight for using the personal data of 15.000 people for advertising, without prior warning or consent. These people had applied for participation in the Big Brother show.

Press release ISOC Bulgaria (in Bulgarian, 14.05.2005)
http://bg.bigbrotherawards.org/ceremony2005.html