Previous BearAware Campaigns
If you are inspired by any of the following campaigns for your own university campus or organization and would like to borrow/steal the concepts, please let us know and we can work with you to share the original art from these cybersecurity education efforts.
2023
Let’s be real. Cybercriminals stalk global networks looking for weaknesses they can use to access data to sell, to find personally identifiable information to access or create financial accounts, to cripple organizations to collect a ransom, or simply to undermine the trust essential to living in a global community. Each day at Baylor we can stay BearAware by holding ourselves and one another accountable to:
- BeSecure by following cybersecurity best practices
- BeCareful to never share your Duo Verified Push code with anyone
- BePrivate by using the security features of our devices and apps
- BeSafe by protecting our personal, research, and institutional data
- BeAlert against scams and threats to our devices
Be #BearAware and #SecureOurWorld by practicing the cybersecurity basics below and at staysafeonline.org!
2022
Sometimes "fails" happen to the best of us. Our 2022 BearAware campaign featured popular memes of celebrity "fails," such as Jennifer Lawrence falling down stairs, Gordon Ramsay losing his mind, President Barack Obama sharing his disapproval, and more! Each moment highlighted a particular cybersecurity "fail" that we wouldn't want to become part of pop culture lore.
2021
During the global pandemic, many people spent time binging the American version of "The Office." Our 2021 NCSAM/#BearAware campaign tied into the resurgence of this comedy classic, bringing a cybersecurity edge to some of the most classic memes from the series.
2020
Ah, the year that COVID-19 went from a regional phenomenon in China to a global pandemic. For this year's campaign, we likened our new, microbial friend to viruses and other cybersecurity threats. Just as we protect ourselves during a global pandemic, so we should protect our information from "infection" and all of its implications.
2019
We are all cybersecurity heroes when we follow best practices that protect our own information and our community information networks.
2017 & 2018
Memes are hilarious. Cyberattacks aren't. To illustrate this contrast the BearAware campaigns for 2017 and 2018 incorporated popular social media memes that communicated the emotions we all feel as we try to do our best to remain BearAware...and sometimes fail. The campaign was such a success in 2017 and we had so many additional (and new) memes that our design team wanted to incorporate that we ran this campaign for two years using an ever fresh stream of memes. So, enjoy these timeless, hilarious reminders to stay BearAware!
[See the 2017 Campaign] [See the 2018 Campaign]
2016
On July 6, 2016, Pokemon Go was released in the United States, setting off a craze that sent people wandering all over creation with their devices to "catch 'em all." In response to this world cultural phenomenon (that unfortunately began to fade a bit in September 2016) our designers developed a BearAware campaign based on the original Pokemon card game. Different Pokemon rendered in negative geometric shapes represented different tips for the Baylor community. Each tip was rendered as a 16-bit question with either a Yes or No response with the general theme, "Don't Catch 'Em All."
2015
After repeating the "Clickaholics Anonymous" theme due to its value and the lack of a better idea, our creative team decided to borrow a theme from another institution, but give it our own flair. The colorful landscape from the imaginative worlds of Dr. Seuss adorn the 2015 NCSAM/BearAware campaign materials. We dressed the most common cybersecurity threats in Seussian verse and have found that the whimsical visuals are catching eyes around our campus and that the childlike allure of the campaign is engaging people.
2013 & 2014
Recognizing that the most common, yet severe, forms of information security breaches begin with a simple "click" we deemed ourselves "clickaholics" and sent our entire campus to "Clickaholics Anonymous" in celebration of National Cybersecurity Awareness Month. The art is a style parody of Alcoholics Anonymous and we even came up with our own 12 steps to being more cybersecure.
2012
The "For Dummies" book series is a cultural institution, so why isn't there a Cybersecurity for Dummies book? That question inspired the 2012 NCSAM/BearAware campaign as we featured our key cybersecurity themes in the design theme of the "For Dummies" books. The familiar design of the book covers combined with the tips that were subtly contextualized within our community (1845 is the year Baylor was founded, for instance) made a strong connection and hopefully communicated with our audiences.
2011
Our 2011 public awareness campaign took its inspiration from pop artist Roy Lichtenstein. We knew that his use of bold colors and his immediately recognizable design would attract the eyes of people around the Baylor community. These striking images with their contextualized warnings were effective in helping to educate our faculty, staff and students.
2010
Embracing the fact that National Cybersecurity Awareness Month occurs in October, for the 2010 campaign we embraced Halloween and turned back to the horror film/monster themes of 2007/8. Deemed "BearScare" by some, this approach to educating our community embraced the theme but we remain unsure where leveraging fear to create awareness is truly effective.
2009
Having explored pop culture icons from the 1950s and 1980s, we decided to turn to testimonials for our 2009 campaign. We talked with several people in the Baylor community who had been impacted directly by cybercrime. Two students and one staff member volunteered to share their story with the Baylor community in order to raise awareness about cybersecurity threats and prevent the same thing that happened to them from happening to others.
2008
Sticking with the theme of cultural revival, for the 2008 BearAware campaign we played on several stock 1980s comic book characters to raise awareness about cybersecurity threats. We used one poster per week of the month to represent the theme treated in our events throughout the month. The campaign was very effective from a visual standpoint, resulting in several poster thefts and many comments from people in the Baylor community.
2007
For our first BearAware Cybersecurity Awareness Month, we borrowed a visual campaign used previously by another institution. The B-Movie Horror film posters characterized different cyber-threats while playing on actual title of motion pictures. Because of the changing nature of cybersecurity, we created one new poster and added it to the collection we borrowed.