What is cyberbullying, exactly?

     

"Cyberbullying" is when a child, preteen or teen is tormented, threatened, harassed, humiliated, embarrassed or otherwise targeted by another child, preteen or teen using the Internet, interactive and digital technologies or mobile phones. It has to have a minor on both sides, or at least have been instigated by a minor against another minor. Once adults become involved, it is plain and simple cyber-harassment or cyberstalking. Adult cyber-harassment or cyberstalking is NEVER called cyberbullying.

     

It isn't when adult are trying to lure children into offline meetings, that is called sexual exploitation or luring by a sexual predator. But sometimes when a minor starts a cyberbullying campaign it involves sexual predators who are intrigued by the sexual harassment or even ads posted by the cyberbullying offering up the victim for sex.

     

The methods used are limited only by the child's imagination and access to technology. And the cyberbully one moment may become the victim the next. The kids often change roles, going from victim to bully and back again.

     

Children have killed each other and committed suicide after having been involved in a cyberbullying incident.

     

Cyberbullying is usually not a one time communication, unless it involves a death threat or a credible threat of serious bodily harm. Kids usually know it when they see it, while parents may be more worried about the lewd language used by the kids than the hurtful effect of rude and embarrassing posts.

     

Cyberbullying may rise to the level of a misdemeanor cyberharassment charge, or if the child is young enough may result in the charge of juvenile delinquency. Most of the time the cyberbullying does not go that far, although parents often try and pursue criminal charges. It typically can result in a child losing their ISP or IM accounts as a terms of service violation. And in some cases, if hacking or password and identity theft is involved, can be a serious criminal matter under state and federal law.

     

When schools try and get involved by disciplining the student for cyberbullying actions that took place off-campus and outside of school hours, they are often sued for exceeding their authority and violating the student's free speech right. They also, often lose. Schools can be very effective brokers in working with the parents to stop and remedy cyberbullying situations. They can also educate the students on cyberethics and the law. If schools are creative, they can sometimes avoid the claim that their actions exceeded their legal authority for off-campus cyberbullying actions. We recommend that a provision is added to the school's acceptable use policy reserving the right to discipline the student for actions taken off-campus if they are intended to have an effect on a student or they adversely affect the safety and well-being of student while in school. This makes it a contractual, not a constitutional, issue.

 

     

There are two kinds of cyberbullying, direct attacks (messages sent to your kids directly) and cyberbullying by proxy (using others to help cyberbully the victim, either with or without the accomplice's knowledge). Because cyberbullying by proxy often gets adults involved in the harassment, it is much more dangerous.

 

 

     

1. Instant Messaging/Text Messaging Harassment [Learn More...]
        2. Stealing Passwords [Learn More...]
        3. Blogs [Learn More...]
        4. Web Sites [Learn More...]
        5. Sending Pictures through E-mail and Cell Phones [Learn More...]
        6. Internet Polling [Learn More...]
        7. Interactive Gaming [Learn More...]
        8. Sending Malicious Code [Learn More...]
        9. Sending Porn and Other Junk E-Mail and IMs [Learn More...]
        10. Impersonation [Learn More...]

     

 

        a) Kids may send hateful or threatening messages to other kids, without realizing that while not said in real life, unkind or threatening messages are hurtful and very serious.
       
        b) Warning wars - Many Internet Service Providers offer a way of "telling on" a user who is saying inappropriate things. Kids often engage in "warning wars" which can lead to kicking someone offline for a period of time. While this should be a security tool, kids sometimes use the Warn button as a game or prank.
       
        c) A kid/teen may create a screen name that is very similar to another kid's name. The name may have an additional "i" or one less "e". They may use this name to say inappropriate things to other users while posing as the other person.

     

d) Text wars or text attacks are when kids gang up on the victim, sending thousands of text-messages to the victim's cell phone or other mobile device. The victim is then faced with a huge cell phone bill and angry parents.

     

e) Kids send death threats using IM and text-messaging as well as photos/videos. (see below)

     

     

 

        a) A kid may steal another child's password and begin to chat with other people, pretending to be the other kid. He/she may say mean things that offend and anger this person's friends or even strangers. Meanwhile, they won't know it is not really that person they are talking to.
       

     

Cyberbullying by proxy is when a cyberbully gets someone else to do their dirty work. Most of the time they are unwitting accomplices and don't know that they are being used by the cyberbully. Cyberbullying by proxy is the most dangerous kind of cyberbullying because it often gets adults involved in the harassment and people who don't know they are dealing with a kid or someone they know.

     

"Warning" or "Notify Wars" are an example of cyberbullying by proxy. Kids click on the warning or notify buttons on their IM screen or e-mail or chat screens, and alert the ISP or service provider that the victim has done something that violates their rules. If the victim receives enough warnings or notifications, they can lose their account. The service providers are aware of this abuse, and often check and see if the warning were justified. But all the cyberbully has to do is make the victim angry enough to say something rude or hateful back. Then, BINGO! they warn them, making it look like the victim had started it. In this case, the ISP or service provider is the innocent accomplice of the cyberbully.

     

Sometimes the victim's own parents are too. If the cyberbully can make it look like the victim is doing something wrong, and the parents are notified, the parents will punish the victim. Alyssa, one of our Teenangels, had this happen to her. To learn more about her cyberbullying problem, read Alyssa's story.

     

Cyberbullying by proxy sometimes starts with the cyberbully posing as the victim. They may have hacked into their account or stolen their password. They may have set up a new account pretending to be the victim. But however they do it, they are pretending to be the victim and trying to create problems for the victim with the help of others.

     

The most typical way a cyberbullying by proxy attack occurs is when the cyberbully gets control of the victim's account and sends out hateful or rude messages to everyone on their buddy list pretending to be the victim. They may also change the victim's password so they can't get into their own account. The victim's friends get angry with the victim, thinking they had sent the messages without knowing they have been used by the cyberbully. But it's not always this minor. Sometimes the cyberbully tries to get more people involved.

     

For example...Mary wants to get Jennifer back for not inviting her to her party. She goes online and, posing as Jennifer, posts "I hate Brittany, she is so stupid, ugly and fat!" on buddyprofile.com. Mary may tell Brittany and her friends that she read the post on buddyprofile.com and blames Jennifer for being mean. Brittany and her friends now start attacking Jennifer, and may report her to buddyprofile.com or her school. They are doing Mary's dirty work for her. Mary looks like the "good guy" and Jennifer may be punished by her parents, lose her account with buddyprofile.com and get into trouble at school. And Brittany and her friends may start to cyberbully Jennifer too.

     

Sometimes it is much more serious than that. When cyberbullies want to get others to do their dirty work quickly, they often post information about, or pose as, their victim in hate group chat rooms and on their discussion boards. Cyberbullies have even posted this information in child molester chat rooms and discussion boards, advertising their victim for sex. They then sit back and wait for the members of that hate group or child molester group to attack or contact the victim online and, sometimes, offline.

     

For this to work, the cyberbully needs to post offline or online contact information about the victim. Real information, not the account they used to impersonate the victim (if they are posing as the victim to provoke an attack). For example...Jack is angry that Blake was chosen as captain of the junior varsity basketball team. Blake is black. Jack finds a white supremist group online and posts in their chat room that Blake said nasty things about whites and their group in particular. He then posts Blake's cell phone number and screen name. People from the group start calling and IMing Blake with threats and hateful messages. Jack has no idea how much danger he has placed Blake in, and Blake doesn't know why he in under attack. In cases of cyberbullying by proxy, when hate or child molester groups are involved, the victim is in danger of physical harm and law enforcement must be contacted immediately.

     

Can you think of examples of cyberbullying by proxy? Share them with us and other kids, preteens and teens here at the site. We'll never use your name or personally identifying information, share it with others or bother you. Read our privacy policy to know how we use your information. You should always read a privacy policy before submitting anything to anywhere online

 

     

Educating the kids about the consequences (losing their ISP or IM accounts) helps. Teaching them to respect others and to take a stand against bullying of all kinds helps too.
        
        

        Because their motives differ, the solutions and responses to each type of cyberbullying incident has to differ too. Unfortunately, there is no "one size fits all" when cyberbullying is concerned. Only two of the types of cyberbullies have something in common with the traditional schoolyard bully. Experts who understand schoolyard bullying often misunderstand cyberbullying, thinking it is just another method of bullying. But the motives and the nature of cybercommunications, as well as the demographic and profile of a cyberbully differ from their offline counterpart.

 

     

Education can help considerably in preventing and dealing with the consequences of cyberbullying. The first place to begin an education campaign is with the kids and teens themselves. We need to address ways they can become inadvertent cyberbullies, how to be accountable for their actions and not to stand by and allow bullying (in any form) to be acceptable. We need to teach them not to ignore the pain of others.

     

Teaching kids to “Take 5!” before responding to something they encounter online is a good place to start. Jokingly, we tell them to “Drop the Mouse! And step away from the computer and no one will get hurt!” We then encourage them to find ways to help them calm down. This may include doing yoga, or deep-breathing. It may include running, playing catch or shooting hoops. It may involve taking a bath, hugging a stuffed animal or talking on the phone with friends. Each child can find their own way of finding their center again. And if they do, they will often not become a cyberbully, even an inadvertent cyberbully. Teaching them the consequences of their actions, and that the real “Men in Black” may show up at their front door sometimes helps. Since many cyberbullying campaigns include some form of hacking or password or identity theft, serious laws are implicated. Law enforcement, including the FBI, might get involved in these cases.

     

But we need to recognize that few cyberbullying campaigns can succeed without the complacency and the often help of other kids. If we can help kids understand how much bullying hurts, how in many cases (unlike the children’s chant) words can hurt you, fewer may cooperate with the cyberbullies. They will think twice before forwarding a hurtful e-mail, or visiting a cyberbullying “vote for the fat girl” site, or allowing others to take videos or cell phone pictures of personal moments or compromising poses of others. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said that in the end we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. We need to teach our children not to stand silently by while others are being tormented. While it is crucial that we teach them not to take matters into their own hands (and perhaps become a "vengeful angel" cyberbully themselves) they need to come to us. And if we expect them to trust us, we need to be worthy of that trust. (Read more about this at "Goldilocks and the cyberbullies...not too hot and not too cold," a guide for parents.)

     

And, in addition to not lending their efforts to continue the cyberbullying, if given an anonymous method of reporting cyberbullying Web sites, profiles and campaigns, kids can help put an end to cyberbullying entirely. School administration, community groups and even school policing staff can receive these anonymous tips and take action quickly when necessary to shut down the site, profile or stop the cyberbullying itself.

     

They can even let others know that they won’t allow cyberbullying, supporting the victim, making it clear that they won’t be used to torment others and that they care about the feelings of others is key.

     

We need to teach our children that silence, when others are being hurt, is not acceptable. If they don’t allow the cyberbullies to use them to embarrass or torment others, cyberbullying will quickly stop. It’s a tall task, but a noble goal. And in the end, our children will be safer online and offline. We will have helped create a generation of good cybercitizens, controlling the technology instead of being controlled by it.