Cyberbullying And What To Do About It

In an ideal world, there would be no bullying. People would get on with one another and would show others respect. Sadly, bullying is all too common, whether it’s among kids at school or even adults in the workplace. Even though a lot of work is being done to prevent it, the fact of the matter is that it will always exist – there will always be bullies out there. Unfortunately, many people use the inter-net to stalk, harass and threat others. This is referred to as ‘cyberbullying’ and is a huge problem as it makes it much easier for bullies to communicate with their victims.

Forms of Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying is a term that covers a wide range of acts and practices that are carried out online and are intended to harm someone. There are several main types of cyberbullying:

• Cyberstalking. What this refers to is the act of stalking someone online. The bully re-peatedly sends messages to the victim through one or more channels (such as social media sites). If the victim blocks the bully in any way, the bully simply tries to reach the victim through some other platform. Messages can become threatening and abu-sive, and the bully may even encourage others to send messages to the victim.
• Doxing/Outing. This is when someone reveals sensitive or personal details about someone else online without their consent. It’s done to embarrass, humiliate or upset the victim. The information revealed can be anything that the victim doesn’t want to be shared, such as private messages and photos, or details about their beliefs, sexu-ality or family history.
• Fraping. The term ‘fraping’ comes from the words ‘Facebook’ and ‘raping’. It refers to someone posting content through someone else’s social media page without their consent. The content posted can be harmful: for example, the bully may post offen-sive messages or may directly attack someone the victim knows.
• Masquerading. If someone is masquerading, it means they’ve set up a fake account and are pretending to be someone else. They do this in order to bully someone, but keep their actual identity hidden from the victim at the same time.
• Trickery. This is when a bully initially befriends the victim online and tries to build up trust with them. They then abuse the victim’s trust and share personal details about them with others without the victim’s consent.
• Harassing. Online harassment can involve many different things, including the bully posting messages online mocking a victim’s race, gender, sexual orientation, back-ground, beliefs, disability or something else about them.
• Exclusion. This is when a bully deliberately excludes the victim from some sort of online group or doesn’t invite the victim to a real-life gathering that other friends are invited to. Exclusion is meant to make the victim feel left out and upset.

These are just a few examples of the sorts of things people do online to bully others. The list is by no means exhaustive; the examples we’ve listed are some of the more common ones. Basically, if someone does something online to harm, harass or upset someone else, it’s cyberbullying.

Combatting Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying is a very big problem, affecting millions of us. It’s particularly common among chil-dren and teenagers. Younger people tend to spend more time online than older people, and are more likely to have accounts on multiple different social media sites (where a lot of cyberbullying takes place). In fact, it’s been found that just over a third of American children aged 12-17 have experienced it some form.

Just like real-life bullying, cyberbullying will always exist. The good news is that a lot of work is be-ing done to make it less prevalent and to help those affected. Schools, universities and other educa-tional institutions offer a range of resources, information and help for those being bullied online, as well as those who have witnessed others being bullied.

Many of the major social media platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook, have features that can help crack down on cyberbullying. For example, Twitter has a bystander reporting feature, which lets you report an account whose owner is being threatening or abusive to someone. There are also many different privacy features: you can block other accounts, delete your own posts or hide them from select others and decide who can see and access your profile.

Just about all kinds of social sites, such as messaging boards and forums, have policies about re-spectful conduct. Anyone whose behaviour goes against the site’s rules will have their account de-leted sooner or later.

If you’re getting bullied online, reach out to someone you know or look online for help. Make use of a site’s services and features to reduce contact with the bully/bullies. Also, think carefully about what you post online; it’s always a good idea not to post things that are too personal, for example.

To sum up, cyberbullying can take many forms, but there’s a lot of resources and help readily available to those who are being bullied online in any way.