Olivia Hsieh, Mason Mann, Jonathan Hatley

With the onset of GDPR and controversies like Cambridge Analytica and Palantir’s ties to the CIA, FBI, and NSA, data privacy has grown in importance and public awareness. Switchboard focuses on the omnipresent nature of uberveillance and the spectrum of existing responses to it, namely a resignation to the overbearing nature of institutional monitoring and, in contrast, sharp pushback and empowerment through taking control of one’s own data. We provide an alternate form of communication that exists in the remnants of our technological world and its societal collapse. In this society, inhabitants scavenge for parts to communicate in close proximity and attempt to evade surveillance to preserve their sense of self.