NIOB | 2020 | The Glass Man | Bimetallic Coin

On March 11, 2020, the latest issue of the silver niobium coin series of the Austrian Mint appeared. The theme of the niobium coin 2020 is the "Glass Man". Thus, the Austrian Mint once again takes on a highly topical issue. Increasingly, data from our everyday lives are collected and aggregated by transnational corporations, but also by the state. The surveillance of users and citizens is taking on ever more absolute forms, while the new technologies of digitalization and Big Data are opening up completely new possibilities for collecting and combining data. Huge data centers collect information about us and algorithms draw conclusions from it.

Not only on the Internet, where every click of every user is monitored, we are also increasingly being monitored offline: through "smart" video surveillance of public places, the "transparent patient" in healthcare or the transparent employee in the company.

The comprehensive collection of data harbors the danger that citizens and customers will lose their privacy and sovereignty. But for anyone who values participation in the present, there is no alternative to the digital world. With the Niob 2020, the Austrian Mint wants to address the issue and asks: How can we benefit from the new technology without accepting its disadvantages?

The side of the coin: The niobium part of the lapel shows a stylized human eye, which stands for ubiquitous surveillance on the one hand and refers to the biometric method of retinal scanning on the other. The silver ring, on the other hand, is supposed to represent a camera lens. Like previous coins in the series, the niobium part is again colored in two colors. In the greenish shimmering background the eye motif is sketched quite naturally, above it lies a violet "second eye" designed like a modern logo.

The obverse: On the niobium part, a group of people is indicated, overlaid by purple squares. The coin image is thus reminiscent of video sequences from surveillance videos, where surveillance software marks the recognized people with quadrants. The characters in the silver ring indicate the captured data about the people.