Trend Micro ‘What’s Your Story’ contest promotes responsible online behavior

MANILA, Philippines - Trend Micro Inc., a global leader in content security, recently announced the winners of “What’s Your Story,” an international competition that harnessed the creativity of the Filipino youth in making videos that promote values and habits of conscientious digital citizenship.

Launched for the first time in the Asia-Pacific region, the “What’s Your Story” contest encouraged the youth to influence their peers by sharing their ideas on how to maintain a good reputation online.

The competition is part of the initiatives under the Click Right campaign, an advocacy designed to provide useful tools and information to parents, youth, educators, and guardians in managing important concerns such as online etiquette, online security, and protection against child pornography.

“Trend Micro is committed to building a safe online environment for all digital citizens, most especially kids and their families,” said Myla Pilao, TrendLabs marketing communications director.

“We believe that protecting kids online is a shared responsibility. Through ‘What’s Your Story,’ we created an avenue to empower the youth to voice out their thoughts on how best to safeguard their reputation through online safety practices,” Pilao added.

In its inaugural year in the Philippines, the “What’s Your Story” contest garnered 72 entries, the most in the Asia-Pacific region, for both individual (aged 18 and above) and school categories (participants between 13 and 17 years old; entry submission through a school representative).

Amabel Mabel Bautista bested 43 other entries with her video “Good Online Rep” and was awarded the grand prize for the individual category, while Rephael Catap’s video entitled “The Internet in the Modern Days: Benefits, Consequences” was named as runner-up.

On the other hand, the school category collected 28 entries and saw “The Story of My (Online) Life” by Marie Pellejo and “BACKFIRE” by Shaira Jill Sera Jose win the grand prize and runner-up award, respectively.

The grand prize winners took home $2,000, while the runners-up got $600. Meanwhile, “Pindot” by Julius Cea accepted the Audience Choice award and received $400 after being honored as the fan-favorite video with the most Facebook votes.

The Philippines’ top two entries competed with the winning videos from Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan in the Asia-Pacific regional competition.

Pellejo’s inspirational ”The Story of My (Online) Life,” a video about learning to protect her online reputation through life experiences, was recognized as one of the two overall winners and got the grand prize of $5,000. She is the first Philippine representative to nab this honor in the regional competition.

“Through this (What’s Your Story) video contest, we are glad to see that the younger generation from all four countries are highly aware of how to protect themselves online,” said Jenny Chang, chief culture officer of Trend Micro.

“We believe the event has reached our goal of getting the youth involved in raising the consciousness of online reputation, including the actions (think before click, think before posting) needed by families and teenagers to use the Internet correctly and safely,” Chang added.

For more information on the “What’s Your Story” contest, visit the official website at http://whatsyourstory.trendmicro.ph.