Privacy Awareness Week 2019: Protecting privacy is everyone’s responsibility

Victoria will be observing national Privacy Awareness Week from 13 – 17 May 2019. Each year, privacy regulators join across the Asia Pacific region to mark the occasion.  This year’s theme is: Protecting privacy is everyone’s responsibility.

Privacy Awareness Week is a chance to share the privacy message with family, friends, and the wider community. Increasingly, we appreciate that when privacy is handled poorly, it can cause considerable financial and reputational damage to organisations and serious harm to individuals.

Personal information is being collected and shared at unprecedented rates by a myriad of different and often invisible parties. Government has a role to play in protecting privacy, but so too do individuals – privacy as a shared responsibility also means that all of us as members of the public need to be aware of the privacy impact of our own actions, particularly how those actions affect others.

OVIC’s events include a public forum featuring guest speakers on the topic of privacy governance as well as a seminar on responding to data breaches. These events will be livestreamed, with a link to the video posted on OVIC’s Twitter page: @OVIC_AU.

OVIC has also developed a Privacy Awareness Week Starter Pack containing a range of resources for organisations to download and use, including posters, tip sheets, and online materials – available on OVIC’s website www.ovic.vic.gov.au/paw.

We look forward to you joining us in spreading the message that protecting privacy is everyone’s responsibility as part of this year’s Privacy Awareness Week.

Quotes attributable to the Victorian Information Commissioner, Sven Bluemmel

“Good privacy practices should not only be upheld because it’s the law, but because it is an important part of creating a better society. Protecting privacy truly is everyone’s responsibility.”

“Poor privacy practices by some can cause harm to all of us by undermining trust in democratic processes.  Because of this, it is vital that we empower every person to understand the impact their individual privacy choices can have”