Cyberbulling: Not a Sign of Heroism

 

MOHIT CHANDAK

Cyberbullying, a Threat to Society

As it is perfectly quoted “BEING A BULLY ON THE INTERNET IS A SIGN OF INSECURITY AND WEAKNESS.”

Cyberbullying or Cyberharassment is a form of bullying or harassment using electronic means. Cyberbullying and cyber harassment are also known as online bullying. It has become increasingly common, especially among teenagers, as the digital sphere has expanded and technology has advanced. Cyberbullying is when someone, typically a teenager, bullies or harasses others on the internet and other digital spaces, particularly on social media sites. Harmful bullying behaviour can include posting rumours, threats, sexual remarks, a victims' personal information, or pejorative labels (i.e., hate speech). Bullying or harassment can be identified by repeated behaviour and an intent to harm. Victims of cyberbullying may experience lower self-esteem, increased suicidal ideation, and various negative emotional responses, including being scared, frustrated, angry, or depressed.

Cyberbullying is a multifarious issue. However, the objective of this activity is one and the same. To hurt people and bring them harm. Cyberbullying is not a light matter. It needs to be taken seriously as it does have a lot of dangerous effects on the victim. Moreover, it disturbs the peace of mind of a person. Many people are known to experience depression after they are cyberbullied. In addition, they indulge in self-harm. All the derogatory comments made about them makes them feel inferior. It also results in a lot of insecurities and complexes. The victim which suffers cyberbullying in the form of harassing starts having self-doubt. When someone points at your insecurities, they only tend to enhance. Similarly, the victims worry and lose their inner peace. Other than that, cyberbullying also tarnishes the image of a person. It hampers their reputation with the false rumours spread about them. Everything on social media spreads like wildfire. Moreover, people often question the credibility. Thus, one false rumour destroys people’s lives. A healthy mind doesn’t speak ill of others.

Cyberbullying prevention is the need of the hour. It needs to be monitored and put an end to. There are various ways to tackle cyberbullying. We can implement them at individual levels as well as authoritative levels.

Firstly, always teach your children to never share personal information online. For instance, if you list your home address or phone number there, it will make you a potential target of cyberbullying easily.

Secondly, avoid posting explicit photos of yourself online. Also, never discuss personal matters on social media. In other words, keep the information limited within your group of friends and family. Most importantly, never ever share your internet password and account details with anyone. Keep all this information to yourself alone. Be alert and do not click on mysterious links, they may be scams. In addition, teach your kids about cyberbullying and make them aware of what’s wrong and right.

In conclusion, awareness is the key to prevent online harassment. We should make the children aware from an early age so they are always cautious. Moreover, parents must monitor their children’s online activities and limit their usage. Most importantly, cyberbullying must be reported instantly without delay. This can prevent further incidents from taking place.

To summarise, “ Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life, define yourself.”

 

 

KINSHUK KUMAR

Affect on Mental Health

Any type of bullying can have different impacts on the people of any age group like anxiety, fear and depression, low self-esteem, behavioural changes and many more things these few of the challenges that may experience if they are being targeted or are the victims of this cyber bullying already. The main possible reason is of getting bullied in front of people or may be online platforms where people are free to express their views and thoughts and can comment on anyone anytime without hesitation and fear.

 

Mental Effects of cyberbullying: When someone becomes a target of cyber bullying they may relate to the world around them differently than Others. For many it feels like life is hopeless and meaningless. They may lose interest in the things which they used to enjoy earlier and they may avoid talking to family and friends. And in some cases depression and suicidal thoughts could come.

Victims of cyber bullying can feel depressed and lonely this condition can lead to major mental problems and could be a tension for the family. Increasing levels of cyber bullying lead to higher level of depression, sadness and hopelessness. Sometimes people who are being  cyber bullied  respond to their intense feelings by harming themselves in some or the other way or may attempt suicide.

 

 

 

MONIKA RAJESH DHULL

What to do if you are being cyberbullied?

·        Ignore it

Victims should try not to react to “minor teasing or name-calling” online as far as they can avoid it. Bullies always want to extract or elicit a reaction from their victims and are encouraged even more when the specified reaction has been achieved.

·        Record

Victims should keep an in-depth record of the interactions and the bullying messages received by them through the bully either soft or hard copy. Keeping a chronological record will help the relevant authority to properly analyse the situation, and verify the kind of interaction that went down between both parties.

·        Reaching out to a trusted authority or guardian

Victims should reach out to their parents, their favourite teacher, school administrators, counsellors, and even police officers who can help them deal with cyberbullying. These trusted individuals can enlist a lot of methods and laws to protect the victim and help them with an appropriate approach. It’s also helpful that the victim talks to their friends or a counsellor so that they can get their support when they feel upset or unsettled by the hurtful messages or comments.

·        Cutting off the bully

It is advised that victims should stop all contact with the bully as soon as probable. Victims should block their phone number so that they no longer receive their calls or texts. If that’s not an option then they should contemplate changing phone numbers. Social Media platforms allow us to block other users if we no longer intent to interact with them anymore. Cyberbullying can be persistent thus making fake ids or new accounts to continue bullying the victims. The victims should avoid even a minimal interaction with them and leave their messages or comments unseen.

·        Going high-tech

If victims are being bullied online via a website or social media, the bully is violating the website’s terms of use and policies. Reporting bullies to the website administrator will get their accounts restricted permanently and they will be banned from the website too. Facebook and YouTube, some of the largely prominent sites for cyberbullying activity, victims can report cyberbullying incidents to the sites’ “safety centres.” The Cyberbullying Research Centre also notes that the parents can help by getting in touch with the internet service provider, cell phone service provider, or content provider. These providers will look into the offensive content and will help the victims in taking down the hurtful posts.

 

 

 

SATYAM KUMAR

Cases of Cyberbullying in India

Cyberbullying is when one person or a group of people try to threaten, tease or embarrass someone else by using a mobile phone or the Internet. Cyber bullying [can be, and is oftentimes,] just as harmful as bullying in the real world. The bullies attack many of the same characteristics of a person that a school bully would, except with the proliferation of social media, these attacks have become more personalized and may occur during any part of the day or night . What makes cyberbullying so dangerous is that it gives bullies the ability to embarrass anyone they want in public at any hour of the day, using multiple different types of technology. These can include devices such as, cell phones, instant messaging platforms, tablets, interactive gaming websites, and even email .

Instagram has also become a mode of cyber bullying. There have been cases of cyberbullying on Instagram too. It can take place through posting embarrassing photos of a person, putting hash tags which can be insulting, posting something defaming or cruel comments, creating fake profiles.18 Today, social media has become a large platform for cyber bullying. Confession pages are new and have held attention of most.19 A confession page of a community or institute allows people to post anything about anybody without their identity being revealed.

But in some cases Cyberstalking which is another kind of bullying or harassment by using electronic communications to stalk a victim may actually present a plausible and real threat to the victim’s safety, life and liberty. Children in India reported the third-highest online bullying rate, after China and Singapore, among the 25 countries surveyed under a commissioned project by Microsoft Corporation to understand the global pervasiveness of online bullying.

 

Although in India, there is no specific law which focuses on ‘cyber-bullying’ there are adequate provisions in three statutes, which treat it as a serious criminal offence, for instance under Indian Penal Code (IPC) there are Sections like, Section 499: for Defamation, Section 292A: dealing with Printing, etc. Finally, there is a newer law named “The Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POCSO Act) which protects children below the age of 18 years from any form of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and pornography that includes cyberbullying as well. In India, the Ministry of Women and Child Development and the Ministry of Home Affairs have launched dedicated helplines and portals for reporting crimes against women and children including cybercrimes. You may visit : https://cybercrime.gov.in/

to report cyberbullying, online harassment, and cyber defamation, particularly against women and children .

 

So here are some cases of Cyberbullying in India :

Rithika Sharma Case :

Ritika Sharma , who studies at a prominent Delhi school, went to the police after being stalked by a Facebook user whom she had befriended on the site a month ago. She had given her cell phone number to the man who was later found to be using a fake name, photo and phone number. Experts say cyberbullying and cyberstalking are increasingly becoming a daily problem for the city's schoolkids with people using electronic communication like emailing, social networking and texting to harass or pursue them .

Ritu Kohli Case :

Ritu Kohli's Case was the first cyber stalking case reported in India. A girl named Ritu Kohli filed a complaint in 2001 that someone else is using her identity in social media and she was deliberately getting calls from different numbers she was also getting calls from abroad. A case was also filed under Section 509 of Indian penal code.

The fact that cyber stalking does not involve physical contact may create the misperception that it is more benign than physical stalking. This is not necessarily true. As the Internet becomes an ever more integral part of our personal and professional lives, stalkers can take advantage of the ease of communications as well as increased access to personal information. Whereas a potential stalker may be unwilling or unable to confront a victim in person or on the telephone, he or she may have little hesitation sending harassing or threatening electronic communications to a victim. As with physical stalking, online harassment and threats may be a prelude to a more serious behaviour, including physical violence.

All technology these days produces both good results and notable consequences. The internet is increasingly a perfect case study for this idea. While better connecting the world and democratizing information, the internet has also allowed individuals to hide behind masks of anonymity. This “faceless evil” of the internet is a growing threat for teens, specifically when it comes cyberbullying. Despite a recent ramping up of awareness campaigns, the following cyberbullying facts and statistics indicate the problem is not going away anytime soon

Cyberbullying around the world : International survey of adults in 28 countries which reveal an increasing number of parents have children who have experienced some form of cyberbullying.In total 20,793 interviews were conducted between March 23 – April 6, 2018, among adults aged 18-64 in the US and Canada, and adults aged 16-64 in all other countries.Of particular interest are Russia and Japan. In both countries, parents expressed extremely high levels of confidence that their children did not experience cyberbullying of any kind.

Meanwhile, Indian parents remained among the highest to express confidence that their children were cyberbullied at least sometimes, a number that only grew from 2011 to 2018. Across Europe and the Americas, it also appears more parents are either becoming aware of their children’s negative experiences with cyberbullying, or their children are increasingly experiencing such attacks online.

 

 

HARSH LAMBA

How to prevent Cyberbullying?

Dealing with cyberbullying is rarely easy, but there are steps you can take to cope with the problem. Spending less time on social media or checking texts and emails, for example, and more time interacting with real people, can help you distance yourself from online bullies.

Guidelines for Appropriate Internet Use

Even before they are old enough to use the internet, initiate conversations about Internet safety. Be sure to keep this an open dialogue with your teen. You will likely need to have new discussions as their online activities change and new safety concerns arise.

Some important topics to discuss before your teen goes online include:

• Privacy: Teach your young adult about the importance of maintaining privacy online. Make sure they know to never share personal information, such as physical addresses and phone numbers, with strangers online. Ensure they know to never share any of the passwords to their accounts, even with their close friends.

• Strangers: Let them know that the same rules apply to strangers online as they do in-person. Make sure they know they should be careful about, or avoid altogether, talking to strangers online. Tell them that you don’t always know what someone’s intentions are, and some people may try to befriend you in order to hurt you.

• Permanence: Remind your teen that once something is put online, it cannot ever be truly deleted — even if the post is removed. Let them know that they cannot anticipate or control who may eventually see that content, so they must think very carefully before sharing things online.

 

Set clear guidelines about how you expect your young adult to behave on the internet. Let them know that you expect them to behave as ethically online as you would expect in-person. Consider having your teen sign a youth pledge and signing a Parent pledge yourself.

Remind them that there may be consequences if they violate the pledge and ask them to help hold you accountable as well. Encourage them to ask you questions if anything is unclear when they are online.

 

Laws of Cyberbullying in India:

To have an understanding of cyber law in India it is necessary to what is the meaning of bullying and what is cyberbullying in India.

Bullying means inflicting physical or physiological pain and hurt in a systematic way to distress the victim which are mostly students and employees. And when the bullying is done online it is known as anti-bullying or cyberbullying.  Cyberbullying in the office by the colleagues also comes under the harassment at the workplace in India. With the popularity of the internet in the youth, it is mostly teens who are the perpetrators as well as the victims of anti-bullying or cyberbullying and thus school bullying is very common.

There is no specific legislation that provides for the specific cyberbullying laws in India however provisions such as Section 67 of the Information Technology Act deals with cyberbullying in a way. Section 67 of the act prescribes punishment for publishing or transmitting obscene material in electronic form for a term which may extend to five years and also with fine which may extend to ten lakh rupees.

Other than Section 67 of the IT Act following are the provisions of the cyberbullying laws in India:

Section 507  IPC -  The section states that if anyone receives criminal intimidation by way of an anonymous communication then the person giving threats shall be punished with imprisonment for up to two years. By virtue of word anonymous the offense of anti-bullying and cyberbullying is included in this section.

Section 66 E of IT Act - The section prescribes punishment for violation of privacy. The section states that any person who intentionally violates the privacy by transmitting, capturing or publishing private pictures of others shall be punished with up to three years imprisonment or fine up to three lakhs.

 

 

SUSHANT SOURAV

Overview of an Alarming Threat

What happens when someone calls you nerd or body-shames you online!? What if they post embarrassing photos of you on social media and try to harass you!? If all of that is happening, chances are that you will be dreadful of every notification, text or call you get and most probably you are a threatful target of cyberbullying!

So, what is the dictionary-definition of cyberbullying? It is a form of bullying that takes place via internet-connected devices like smartphones, computers, or tablets. In other words, cyberbullying is the misuse of technology to intimidate, harass, threaten, torment, or humiliate a target, i.e., the person in target. Any online platform that allows sharing of information can become a medium for cyberbullying such as social-networking sites, mails, text messages, games and many more.

Unfortunately, cyberbullying has become an alarming threat. It affects the mental health of the victim and can make his/her life miserable. Not only this, in many uncontrolled cases, the victim commits suicide inspite of fighting back.

In modern world, people are glued to smartphones or laptops, thus giving ample amount of space for cyberbullying to happen. Say for example, scrolling  through Instagram or any other social-networking site, we see numerous hateful posts and even witness the comment-section full of hatredness and misbehaviour. But, there’s no full stop to it.

Manier times, it seems like the only solution to escape from being cyberbullied or witness it happening, is to disconnect from the internet altogether because if all this lingers, it targets the mental health drastically and living seems like suffering. According to stats, India recorded third highest online bullying rate in the global list of cyberbullying. Due to such an incremental path of cyberbullying, the vulnerability has increased manier folds.

So, the ultimate point is to think about the steps of preventing it. Primarily, hiding such incidents from parents or close-ones is not a clever act, rather, sharing it with them is a clever act. Moreover, the sooner you ask for help, the better and sooner you’ll be free of it. But, in any case, whatever you do, refuse to play their game. If they smell blood, they’ll attack again, so don’t show any of your weaknesses to them. Another option is to confront them. The culprits find themselves powerful hiding behind the screen, but face-to-face, it might become a different story, just like a barking dog never bites. And that’s what they do, they just bark online for fun, showing over-coolness, spilling out abusive words, and trying to feel good about themselves.

However, if they are persistent and these strategies don’t work, the very next step is to seek assistance from the legal authorities. There is no specific legislation that provides specific cyberbullying laws in India, but, provisions such as Section 67 of the Information Technology Act deals with cyberbullying in a certain way. Other than Section 67 of the IT Act, Section 507 IPC and Section 66E of IT Act describes cyberbullying as a punishable offence and those found guilty are placed before jurisdiction.

Lastly, there are many people who would say that cyberbullying is not a big deal and many become a part of it wittingly or unwittingly. So, think before saying or judging someone. It is happening with some stranger today, but tomorrow you can also be its prey. Remember, you must always stay strong and walk by the path of humanity at every instance.

💬A small quotation for awareness – 

“Do not blow someone else’s candle in hopes of making your own shine brighter!”

 

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