eSafety Youth Council

Youth Council calls for an inclusive and accessible digital world for all

In June 2025, members of the Youth Council wrote a submission to the World Summit on the Information Society’s (WSIS) 20-year review. WSIS is a United Nations process – you can think of a ‘process’ in this context as a long-term project or series of organised discussions and decisions. WSIS focuses on improving how the internet is run and how digital technology is developed around the world.

Download their submission:

The eSafety Youth Council is a group of young people aged 13 to 24 who help guide eSafety’s work by sharing their ideas, experiences and knowledge about online safety. Launched in 2022, the Council offers an opportunity for young people to influence policy and program design on online safety education and emerging issues.

The Council is made up of young people from all over Australia, with different lived experiences, cultures and gender identities. Read more about the current members in our Meet the eSafety Youth Council page.

The Council was created based on recommendations from Western Sydney University’s Youth engagement report. This research, commissioned by eSafety and co-designed with young people, explored the online experiences of young Australians and inspired the development of the Youth aspirational statement.

Young people sometimes use digital spaces in ways that other age groups don’t, so their perspectives are important when talking about online safety. Their lived experience can help eSafety and the Australian Government identify issues, risks and trends that might otherwise be overlooked. It can also help balance systems that sometimes prioritise adult views and unintentionally overlook young people’s perspectives.

eSafety is committed to listening, learning, and acting on what young people say. When young people lead conversations about the issues that affect them, the outcomes are smarter, stronger and more meaningful.

To date, the Council have discussed and provided insights on:

• the role and influence of the eSafety Youth Council
• young people’s experiences with cyberbullying, online harassment, recommender systems and echo chambers, image-based abuse, and sexual extortion
• the barriers to reporting online harm for young people
• the impacts of age verification and age assurance mechanisms on young people
• the impacts of gaming on young people and their communities
• the influences of generative AI technology on young people
• the considerations of the social media minimum age legislation.

You can learn about your rights in relation to personal information collected by eSafety by reading our Privacy Policy. Our Personal Information Collection Notice explains what information we collect, and what we do with it.

eSafety abides by the Commonwealth Child Safety Framework (CCSF). To see how eSafety creates child safe cultures and practices, please see our Child Safety Policy.