The winners of the 52nd D&AD Professional Awards were announced in the U.K. last night. And among the big winners was this fascinating campaign from the Netherlands, in which ad agency Lemz built a computer model of a girl to catch pedophiles engaging in webcam child sex tourism.
The work, for Terre des Hommes, won a Black Pencil (reserved for category changing work) in advertising and marketing. The video below explains Lemz's campaign, centered on "pro-active policing" of the problem. That meant creating "Sweetie," a computerized version of a 10-year-old Filipino girl, and sending her into online web-chat forums.
The results: The campaign caught 1,000 predators from 71 countries, and the agency handed over their dossiers to Interpol. "Webcam child sex tourism is now a globally recognized problem," says Lemz. "Governments are changing policies. Arrests have been made. Children have been rescued."
It's incredibly ambitious, and a great example of marketing's continued evolution, with help from technology, from outbound messaging to meaningful action.
CREDITS
Client: Terre des Hommes
Agency: LEMZ