Toronto’s Philter Communications has completed a rebranding assignment for Privacy International, a London-based watchdog organization that combats privacy intrusions by government and businesses.
According to Philter partner and creative director Scott Reid, the organization had been struggling to find a suitable replacement for its previous logo before his agency came to the assignment via a referral.
Reid said that previous work on the Privacy International logo had ended up “in a very expected place,” and that the organization was keen to avoid imagery typically associated with the notion of privacy. According to Reid, the word “privacy” is typically linked with “surveillance,” which is manifested in several clichéd visual representations.
“There are way too many fingerprint visuals out there,” said Reid. “And with something like Privacy International, there’s also a focus on globes and things like that.
“Those memes are a little done, and they wanted to avoid those kinds of traps because they treat them in a very narrow way. [Privacy International] deals with everything from counter-terrorism to national ID cards, so it needed to be broad but symbolic and strong at the same time.”
Philter originally created six to eight new logos, with the final version a variation on earlier iterations featuring an all-caps treatment of the words “Privacy International,” accompanied by a vertical red line – intended to signify a break or interruption of policy and/or legislation with something other than the public good at its core.
The objective, he said, was to develop a logo that conveyed both “strength and simplicity.”
“For us it was very much saying this organization exists to interrupt the type of power structures that can be abusive with regards to privacy issues,” said Reid.
The organization’s new logo is scheduled to debut sometime in the early part of the year.
