This post was originally posted on 1 Dec, 2016 on the AARE EduResearch Matters blog under the title: Digital Footprints of children: latest research and the implications.
Australian children are among the youngest and most prolific users of the internet in the world. They are, on average, a little under eight years old when they begin using the internet and most go online daily. So it is not long before they develop an extensive digital footprint. But not much is known about young people’s digital footprint awareness and how to best educate them to manage their growing online presence.
On Tuesday 31st May I was invited to give a seminar at the University of Leicester’s Leicester Learning Institute. I talked about research that I had done with colleagues at the University of Newcastle on the Digital Footprint awareness of university students being an emerging equity issue for higher education. The overview of this research led to a very interesting discussion with those there about equity, digital technologies and cyber ethics. 
Dr Rachel Buchanan 