Article 17 and 25 of the EU Directive 95/46/EC, on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, state that the nature of the data should be taken into account in determining the appropriate level of security for processing and transferring personal data. Except Article 8, which mentions special category of personal data called sensitive data, the directive is silent on the nature of the data. The main objective of this study was to identify the relationship between the level of protection required for the personal data and the nature of the data. Another aspect of this study was to identify under what circumstances individuals were willing to compromise their information privacy. A survey was conducted among young academics in the field of information and communication technology. The participants demanded a higher level of protection for their bank account details, credit and debit card transaction details, income tax details, medical reports on serious illnesses, credit report details and general medical reports. On the other hand, age, both academic and professional qualifications, marital status, hobbies and occupations were considered as low privacy concerned items. Other interesting finding was that the participants prefer to compromise their privacy for public safety and health care rather than compromise their privacy for national security. A large number of participants were not willing to compromise their privacy for research activities. More than one third of the participants were willing to pay for privacy enhancing technologies while one third of the participants were willing to compromise their privacy for short term financial benefits. Even though article 8 of the EU Directive 95/46/EC imposes strict rules for processing sensitive data, the participants did not demand much protection for such data. This study shows the importance of introducing sector specific guidelines for personal data protection. It also highlights the demand for more user friendly privacy enhancing technologies and more privacy awareness among the future driving forces of the Information Technology.