Happiness

Client: Parents of Road Victims
Product: Road Safety
Title: Waze Invaders
Media: Mobile
Country: Belgium
Date Of Campaign: November 7 2022, January 9, 2023

Background: Here are 3 disturbing facts, in Belgium, about children and road accidents: 1.Every day 12 children have an accident on their way to school.2. When luminosity drops, accidents increase by 89%3. The first day after holidays, accidents increase by 62%What's worse, on November 7, and January 9, those 3 disturbing facts came together, an accident waiting to happen. So, Belgium's most famous road safety organisation 'Parents of Road Victims' asked us to take action and make everyone aware.

Idea: Here’s what we did: on the user-based app Waze, drivers can announce police sightings. Inciting other drivers to watch out for the police, and slow down. On November 7, and again on January 9between 7.45 and 8.20 am - right into ’school rush hour’ - suddenly, 6411 police sightings appeared. All at once. One in every school street of Belgium. Tapping into the social behaviour of slowing down when you know there's police. To get there we had to bypass (or, hack, if you wish :-)) the Waze data protocol. Which we did, by creating a little army of virtual bot-drivers. Each of them placing a police sighting, in a Belgian school street. All at the same time, but randomised, With different Ip Addresses and in different languages to prevent Waze to detect anomalies.

Results: No incidents were registered on November 7 or January 9. But equally important on the longer term, this Waze-hack was send to all chiefs of Belgian police to push them for more REAL PRESENCE on dangerous days like these. ALL of them responded and it is now in negotiation to increase police presence in school streets on dark days. They promised to come back via press conference by end of May. To be continued...