The association has been established by current ADF personnel, all with extensive language capability experience. We have been extremely diligent and meticulous in how we have gone about planning the association, which has been informed and shaped by guidance from individuals within the Defence senior leadership. All our staff invest their time for free, because we believe in how important this association is for all Defence linguists, and the benefits it will provide not only back into Defence capability, but also in supporting the development and welfare of our current and ex-serving members.

Our plans for this association have been in the works since 2022, which has provided ample time to conduct extensive consultations with linguists of all kinds, and to establish relations with reputable industry partners.

As a team of current serving and widely experienced military personnel, we are acutely aware of our responsibilities around data protection, Australian Privacy Principles, and security – which includes our responsibilities to the Safeguarding Australia’s Military Secrets Act. Both our website and email infrastructure is hosted by a reputable Australian provider who only uses Australian servers. We also only use encrypted storage solutions that meet Australian Government standards is secure at the PROTECTED level.

In line with this, we have left no stone unturned in the development of our associations policies, procedures, and other establishment documents. The way in which we develop our resources, and where these are stored will always be in compliance with our responsibilities.

Access to the resources produced by the association will largely depend on the individual classification of each resource. Some items will be able to be freely accessed on our website, others will need to be kept on our secure storage system, and some will need to be exclusively produced and stored within either the Defence Protected or Secret Networks – and will only be accessible to current Defence members with the appropriate need-to-know/hold. We will be working closely with Defence to ascertain the best means of achieving this compliance. These efforts will ensure that Defence personnel, their information, and the resources produced by the association is always secure and protected. To that end, we invite you to review our externally accessible policy documents. Our members can also request access to our other internal policies.

Our association values of Service, Professionalism, Integrity, and Respect are very closely aligned with those of Defence, and these embody all that we do. We have also been very open with Defence along the way, and we are actively pursuing steps to receive endorsements from both Defence and the Department of Veteran Affairs, as well as other similarly aligned and reputable veteran organisations.

We also value transparency, insofar as is possible while also adhering to our privacy obligations. Should you ever have any questions about us and how we manage the association, we invite you to get in contact with us at any time via the details on our Contact us page.

Absolutely! As an association run largely by active Defence members, we have a deep understanding of the importance of this topic, and we have been very mindful of data security in establishing our systems. Both our website and email infrastructure is hosted by a reputable Australian provider who only uses Australian servers.

We use only encrypted storage solutions that meet Australian Government standards and is secure at the PROTECTED level. We have also established our Privacy Policy in line with Australian requirements, and have consulted other Australian veteran organisations to build our understanding of how to best protect the data/information that we receive from those interested in joining or volunteering with us.

For membership applications, once we have confirmed your eligibility to join, we securely delete and anonymise whatever information we can to ensure your identity is as protected as possible. We will place you into categorised age brackets (eg. 17-24, 25-34, 35-44 etc.), and also change your recorded location to a nearby suburb to reduce your stored personal information, while retaining enough information to provide our services.

Information around the exact provider that we use is not public information as this would impact the security of the information that we hold. What we can confirm, however, is that the systems used:

• Have undergone Infosec Registered Assessors Program (IRAP) assessments by Australian Signals Directorate endorsed professionals and deemed secure at PROTECTED

• Are locally based servers in Australia and subject to Australian jurisdiction

• Are housed on systems also used by the Department of Defence.

The information you submit to us is always hosted on secure Australian servers, and any information we hold is housed within an encrypted Australian based storage system that is secure at the PROTECTED level and meets Australian Government standards.

We also delete or otherwise anonymise as much information as we can. For instance, we will place you into categorised age brackets (eg. 17-24, 25-34, 35-44 etc.) and also change your recorded location to a nearby suburb to reduce the accuracy of stored information while still retaining enough to effectively provide our services.

This is entirely up to you, however, as an external-to-Defence association, it is our preference that members sign up with their civilian/personal email address. This also reduces the risk of becoming disconnected when on extended leave, or when you transition out of Defence. Additionally, as a general rule, it is always best to only use your Defence email for official Defence business.

No. The team involved in managing the association is well versed in security classification requirements, including what information can be produced and accessed outside the Defence system vs what must only be produced and accessible within the Defence system. Every resource creation activity that the association conducts will first commence with an assessment to determine this, and steps will be taken accordingly. Only resources that are classified at the UNOFFICIAL classification will be accessible by our non-serving members.

Everyone who deals with the association has the right to request for us to delete their data. Any request to delete member data will be actioned in compliance with the clauses set out in our Privacy & security policy. Requests can be submitted via our Data Deletion Request form.

No. All association members need to be mindful of their legislative requirements to not openly discuss the specifics of Defence business with those who do not have a need-to-know/hold. All discussions must be held at the appropriate classification level – which will be informed by variabilities including (but not limited to):

• The people involved in the conversation or within hearing distance (ie if there are civilians or ex-serving and/or foreign members present)

• The need-to-know/hold of those present

As a general rule, the association supports the discussion of language and culture capability that is general in nature, or if military focused that it is at the UNOFFICAL classification level. Any discussions above UNOFFICIAL should only occur within the Defence environment.