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BigBrotherAwards 2006
Up one levelBusiness
The BigBrotherAward in this category goes to: SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication), for sharing bank transfer data with US authorities.
Politics
In this year two “lucky winners” achieve awards in this category: the members of the Fourth Parliament of the State of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania for legislation that allows eavesdropping and sound recording in public space. And the Federal Conference of the Ministers of the Interior for their decision to install a centralised anti-terror data-base.
Technology
This year the Philips company accomplishes the BigBrotherAward in “Technology” for the specification that CD burners write their unique serial number on the CD and thus facilitate tracking of the storage medium to the burner.
Authorities & Administration
And the winner is: the Federal Conference of Ministers for Education. For plans to introduce life-long student IDs, without binding the individual educational data to a defined purpose, nor guarding them against misuse and unauthorised access.
Consumer Protection
The award in this category was well earned by the German Insurers’ Association for its “warnings and indications” database, which insurers use to exchange substantial amounts of data about millions of citizens — with undisclosed criteria, without sufficient legal foundation, and unknown to the people affected.
Notes of Disapproval
Not all nominees for the Big Brother Award have made it. Several times, the jury had great difficulty not to sanction a violation of data protection with one of our unwanted prizes. But data leeches who think they might run off unharmed only because we hand out too few main prizes are harbouring a false sense of security. Because there still are our notes of disapproval.
A short retrospective ...
About Big Brother on German highways, a fee for computers with access to the internet, a radio or a TV card, RFID politics in Europe, and how that's related to the German BigBrotherAwards.
Audience Award 2006
For the first time at the German Big Brother Awards, the audience was asked to decide which of the winners should receive the audience award.
Audience Award 2008