When you post something on the web, can you be sure it stays there? Enter a hidden shadow industry of digital cleaning, where the Internet rids itself of what it doesn’t like. Who is controlling what we see… and what we think?

The big Internet companies, not all which can properly be described “social media”, are drowning in the unending flood of online content. From hate mail to pornography, from depictions of child abuse to manipulated war pictures used for propaganda, the necessity for preventive action is growing – if only to avoid damaging one’s own public image. As a rule, however, this task is not normally performed by the corporations themselves: “outsourcing” is the cheapest solution as well as the most comfortable – and the contracted companies are also responsible for any corresponding mistakes. The result is that in Manila, for example, an untold number of poorly trained and quickly psychologically-impacted “moderators” sit long hours in front of their computer screens and, in accordance to highly schematic and American criteria, use the delete key to wage war against objectionable content on the Internet. The documentary focus of THE CLEANERS is primarily on the work they do, but also looks at the related debate in the USA.

Biography

Hans Block was born in 1985 in Berlin. Initially a music student, he then studied direction at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts and subsequently did directorial work at the BOX studio of the Frankfurt Schauspiel theater. In 2015, his audio drama “Don Don Don Quijote – Attackéee” was awarded the Prix Marulic. His first feature-length documentary, THE CLEANERS, co-directed with Moritz Riesewieck, premiered in 2018 at the Sundance Film Festival.

Moritz Riesewieck was born in 1985, grew up in the Ruhr, and studied at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts (Berlin). Directorial internships followed at the Volksbühne (Berlin), the Thalia Theater (Hamburg), and the Schaubühne (Berlin). In 2014, at the invitation of the Goethe Institute, he staged Georg Büchner’s “Woyzeck” in Mexico City. In 2015, his innovative works won him the Ela Neumann Scholarship. His first feature-length documentary, THE CLEANERS, co-directed with Hans Block, premiered in 2018 at the Sundance Film Festival. Riesewieck’s book of essays, “Digital Dirty Work”, was published in conjunction with the film’s release.

Docudays UA International Documentary Human Rights Film Festival 2019

International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights 2018