Foundry: This is how much an influencer's search history costs
110,000 euros for a glimpse into the most intimate private sphere of YouTube celebrity and Instagram influencer Rafael Neugart? That's how much fans bid on eBay in June for his Internet search history. Foundry and Startpage came up with the campaign to create greater awareness of data protection and privacy.
Rafael Neugart is a YouTube celebrity and Instagram influencer with several hundred thousand followers on social networks - in other words, a person of public interest. On Instagram, he announced in early June that he was putting his entire search history up for sale on eBay - filled to the brim with his most intimate desires, fears and hopes. "I've been a successful YouTuber for eight years, and you can't imagine the absurd things I search for in my videos - and the weird ads I get displayed because of them," Neugart said.
The auction was obviously successful: over 11,000 interested parties visited the eBay listing page and after just four days, the total of 70 bids reached more than 110,000 euros. eBay eventually had to relent and stop the auction. Nevertheless, the message became clear: Our data is more valuable than we think.
The campaign by Rafael Neugart, Foundry and Startpage is intended to demonstrate how user privacy is violated every day on the Internet. According to the initiators, it was not actually planned to earn money by auctioning off the search history. The last bid was supposed to come from Startpage itself. A few days after the auction ended, Rafael Neugart shared a video explaining the action on his YouTube channel.
"For a long time I wasn't aware that there was an option to search on the Internet and remain anonymous. That's why I was keen to do this action. By using Startpage, I no longer have that problem," explains Neugart.
Raising awareness of data protection
The mission of the Startpage search engine is to protect the intimate data of its users. Startpage calls itself the safest search engine in the world, is a test winner at Stiftung Warentest 2019 and offers Google search results without tracking the searchers.
"As uncomfortably revealing as Rafael's auction seems at first glance, many of us unknowingly do the same thing every day: we share our very personal search history with third parties - without receiving anything in return," says Startpage founder Robert E.G. Beens. "Traditional search engines know our most intimate thoughts, fears and dreams - and they profit from it. This knowledge is compiled into a digital profile and resold - usually to actors who then target us with targeted advertising, set price trackers on us or wantonly spread misinformation. At Startpage, we believe that privacy is a human right."
Auction with a mission
Foundry and Startpage's action is designed to show how switching to a privacy-friendly search engine like Startpage is an effective and easy first step to protecting your data.
The stunt is part of a large-scale communication campaign under the motto "Deine Suche. Dein Ding" ("Your search. Your thing"), is currently attracting attention in Berlin and beyond with giant posters, radio spots, online advertising, podcasts, YouTube posts and influencer marketing. (Werbewoche.ch reported).
Responsible at Startpage: Robert E.G. Beens, Jacqueline Dennington, Kelly Finerty, Alexandra Schiffmann, Annette Diegel. Responsible at Foundry: Gustavo Nardini, Lilli Kahana, Hugo Bosio, Alexander Sistenich, Gloria Candelas Leber, Lea Kutz, Pieter Malherbe, Jarin Morová, Eva Lutterbuese, Markus Neumann, Sacha Moser. Responsible for Samyroad Influancer Management: Sonsoles Piñeiro Kruik, Ricky Pombo, Lea Ruiz, Carlota Pombo.
