The Victorian Privacy Commissioner, Helen Versey, is establishing a Youth Reference Group and is seeking nominations from young people aged 15-25.

“The aim of the group is to inform and support the Office’s privacy awareness and policy work with young people. Having a group of young people directly inform and advise my Office about the privacy issues and challenges affecting them will be of enormous benefit to our work.

I am particularly seeking participation by young Victoria’s from our diverse multicultural communities, including the Greek speaking community” Ms Versey said.

Recent Australian research about the way that young Australians use online social media shows that young people can put their privacy at risk.

For example, “sometimes personal information was divulged online without an understanding of the potential consequences of disclosure, for example, posting information about going on holiday and not realising that this could give an unintended recipient information about their whereabouts”

“I have also learnt from talking with young people that they have concerns about being able to keep personal information secret, such as their home address, and they are concerned about strangers knowing things about them that they would prefer to keep private, such as their mobile phone numbers” Ms Versey added.

Nominations to join the reference group are being sought from young people who may be at secondary school, in tertiary education, working or unemployed. Application forms are available at www.privacy.vic.gov.au. Nominations close September 25 .