[JUDGING] Data Protection Commission Ireland x Core
Section: Video: Public Body
Organisation Name: Data Protection Commission Ireland x Core
Video Questions
Name Of Brandclient
Data Protection Commission Ireland
Personpeople Who Runs This Campaign
Cíara Mc Garry / Anthony Hughes / Mark Tuthill
What Is The Name Of The Videovideo Campaign
Pause Before You Post
Do You Use Alt Text In Your Images And Caption Your Videos
Yes. Videos were captioned/subtitled to ensure the campaign message remained accessible and understandable across social environments, including sound-off viewing.
Objectives Of Campaign And Metrics
Pause Before You Post set out to make parents reconsider something that can feel completely harmless: sharing photos and videos of their children online. Rather than explain the risks through a traditional public-information message, we wanted people to feel the consequences of oversharing. The film turns an everyday family moment into something unsettling, revealing how easily information shared about a child can move beyond its intended audience. Success therefore wasn't simply about generating a video view. We wanted the idea to stop people, hold attention and, most importantly, be shared by people themselves. That happened at extraordinary scale. On Instagram alone the film generated 40,010,754 views, reached 28,362,570 people and was shared 883,787 times, with 116,561 saves and 2.1m+ engagements. The wider campaign subsequently achieved 139m+ global reach across 64 countries and six social platforms.
Video 1: Link To The Video Give Stats What Is The Videos Purpose
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DRcD5FijbFU/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsi=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
This was the hero Pause Before You Post film and the execution that exploded organically.
Its purpose was to turn an abstract data-protection issue into an immediate human one. Instead of telling parents that sharing children's lives online carries risks, the film creates a moment where they experience that loss of control themselves.
On Instagram it achieved:
40,010,754 views
28,362,570 reach
2,125,812 engagements
1,120,497 likes
883,787 shares
116,561 saves
4,967 comments
Most strikingly, total watch time reached 18 years, 315 days, 8 hours, 3 minutes and 15 seconds.
For a public-information film, the key result wasn't simply that millions watched it. Hundreds of thousands decided somebody else needed to see it too.
Video 2: Link To The Video Give Stats What Is The Videos Purpose
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QL1FmBaof8
YouTube gave the film a home where audiences could deliberately seek out and watch the campaign beyond their social feeds.
The campaign evidence records approximately 668,000 YouTube views, while the film's wider distribution helped the message move far beyond its original Irish audience.
Its purpose remained deliberately simple: make the hidden consequences of "sharenting" visible and give parents one memorable behaviour to take away — Pause Before You Post.
Video 3: Link To The Video Give Stats What Is The Videos Purpose
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/data-protection-commission-ireland_pausebeforeyoupost-activity-7398691937647755264-eItK?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAABe6FMsBabdhklVGxzJPbbqEMYiyZ53v5f0
LinkedIn demonstrated that the creative could travel beyond consumer social environments and resonate in a professional/public-policy context.
The post generated approximately:
258,872 impressions
180,083 members reached
21,575 engagements
8.3% engagement rate
271,989 video views
4,422 reactions
71 comments
1,386 reposts
Its purpose was to extend the conversation around children's data protection into professional networks while retaining the same simple behavioural message.
Additional Information For The Judges
This wasn't a case of media spend manufacturing scale. The extraordinary reach came from people choosing to watch, share, repost and discuss the film. From an Irish public-information campaign, Pause Before You Post travelled to audiences around the world. Brandwatch recorded 139.11m global reach, while the campaign attracted attention across countries far beyond Ireland. Data protection authorities in Poland, Belgium and France subsequently contacted the DPC to compliment the film and request permission to use it in their own jurisdictions. A message about thinking before sharing became a piece of content people couldn't stop sharing.