Digital Data Clean-Up 2023 - Almost 50 organisations take part!
The Digital Data Clean-Up is a joint campaign by various organisations as part of the CDR Initiative. The aim of the campaign is to encourage employees to clean up their data on hard drives, network drives, in email inboxes and in the cloud and to support them in doing so.
Motivation
There is a huge amount of data in email inboxes and on drives. A lot of (spam) emails are added every day and many employees receive newsletters that they don't actually read. Data drives contain old, unnecessary documents or multiple, almost identical draft versions of a file that take up storage space.
The advantages of digital cleaning are obvious. As well as having a positive impact on the environment and climate, reducing storage space also reduces costs. Participants are also made aware of the need to save data in the long term and a tidy digital desk is also good for their mental health. Ultimately, data protection and security are also arguments in favour of a dedicated digital decluttering process.
Quote from our patron, Federal Minister Steffi Lemke
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"Unimaginable amounts of data are stored in data centres around the world and new data is added every day. This is bad for the protection of consumer data and harms the environment. A Digital Data Clean-Up is therefore the need of the hour. I hope that as many people and organisations as possible will take part in the "Digital Data Clean-Up" campaign of the BMUV's CDR Initiative."
Steffi Lemke
Patron of the "Digital Data Clean-Up" campaign, Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection (*translated from German original)
Almost 50 organisations are taking part in the Digital Data Clean-Up 2023
A total of 49 organisations have responded to the CDR Initiative's call to take part in the campaign. Start-ups, SMEs and large corporations from a wide range of industries are taking part in the campaign. They are joined by public authorities, local authorities, educational and cultural institutions and civil society organisations. This broad spectrum of participants shows that the topic is equally important for all types of organisations.
Voices of participating organisations
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"No health without sustainability - that's why BARMER is already climate-neutral at all its locations. A Digital Data Clean-Up makes it easy for our employees to make their own contribution: to climate-friendly digitalisation and their mental health through a tidy digital desk. Whether customer service, administration, innovation department or executive board - we're on board."
Marek Rydzewski
Chief Digital Officer at BARMER (*translated from German original)
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"Starting from a small employee initiative, we carried out a Digital Data Clean-Up to reduce data waste throughout the Otto Group in 2022, inspiring numerous companies across Germany to join in. I am therefore delighted that we are receiving a boost this year from the BMUV's CDR Initiative and are working with many other companies and organisations to clean up drives, email inboxes and even data in the cloud. Because only together can we raise awareness of the impact of the immense growth in data."
Alexander Birken
CEO, Otto Group (*translated from German original)
The Otto Group as a role model
After the Otto Group, a member of the CDR Initiative, had already successfully carried out a digital spring clean in 2022 and was thus able to make a successful contribution to responsible digitalisation and sustainability (more information in the video and in the Otto Group's CDR Code report), the Otto Group colleagues have also taken the campaign to the CDR Initiative. The campaign is now being implemented in close cooperation with other organisations, following the Otto Group's example.
Implementation during the campaign period
Cleaning will take place during the campaign period from 11.09.2023 to 22.09.2023. The CDR Initiative office has prepared materials for this, such as a quiz and checklists on the key topics of reducing the flood of emails, cleaning up clouds and drives and working digitally with less CO2.
The participating organisations were free to implement these and will, for example, also organise their own participatory calls to clean up together with their colleagues.
Office of the CDR Initiative
