cyber-bullying -

Student guilty in gay cyber-bullying case [ABCNews, 18/3/2012]

Mr Clementi committed suicide days after the images were spread. — PHOTO: Tyler Clementi committed suicide days after the images were spread. (AFP)

An American court has convicted a former student for using a web cam to spy on his gay roommate’s love life and then sharing the images with fellow students.

Days later, in September 2010, the room mate Tyler Clementi killed himself.

Dharun Ravi, 20, has been found guilty of invasion of privacy and will be sentenced in May.

He faces a hefty prison term and possibly deportation to his native India.

Ravi’s lawyer had argued the student was guilty only of a prank gone wrong when he filmed roommate Tyler Clementi kissing a man, before he Tweeted friends about what he had seen and then invited them to watch a live webcam video.

At a news conference, Tyler Clementi’s father Joe urged students to be tolerant.

“To our college, high school and even middle school youngsters I would say this: you are going to meet a lot of people in your lifetime. Some of these people you may not like. But just because you don’t like them does not mean you have to work against them,” he said.

“When you see somebody doing something wrong, tell them: that’s not right, stop it. You can make the world a better place. The change you want to see in the world begins with you.”

Ravi was never accused in Clementi’s death, but he faced a string of charges accusing him of being motivated by anti-gay bias. The jury returned mixed verdicts on that aspect of the charges.

The New Jersey-based Homosexuals rights’ group Garden State Equality welcomed the verdict, saying it showed that Ravi was motivated by bias.

“Ravi has been convicted and will now face the appropriate societal consequences,” the head of Garden State Equality, Steven Goldstein, said in a statement.

“We do believe this verdict sends the important message that a ‘kids will be kids’ defense is no excuse to bully another student.”

In addition to the raft of guilty verdicts on invasion of privacy, Ravi was also found guilty on all charges related to attempting to hinder the prosecution.

School principal warns parents: Get your kids off Facebook it’s a verbal sewer [independent.ie, 22/09/2011]

AN AUSTRALIAN school principal fed up with cyber-bullying has gone to war on Facebook.

Chris Duncan, principal of Lindisfarne Anglican Grammar School, in Tweed Heads, New South Wales used his school newsletter to warn parents in bold print: “GET YOUR KIDS OFF FACEBOOK. THIS VERBAL SEWER IS HARMING YOUR CHILDREN.”
Mr Duncan said he decided to take the radical action after he helped a 16-year-old student who suffered serious abuse on Facebook.
He said he was aware of students who had been sent into an “appalling state” due to abuse they received on Facebook, with some children being more vulnerable than others.
“Some kids deal with it really well and other kids are mortally wounded by it and it’s just the way different kids react to things,” he told the Australian Daily News.
“I, and all of my colleague principals around the country, deal with very distressed young people and very distressed parents who have been subjected to what I would call tirades of verbal abuse on Facebook.”
Mr Duncan said he expelled two students last year for serious online harassment online of other students, one on Facebook and the other on the school’s internal email system.
He said he was not suggesting a blanket Facebook ban, but urged parents to be more proactive.
“My concern is parents are not overly aware of what their kids are subjected to until it gets to the point you’ve got a very distressed, abused young person,” he said.
“Certainly if they’ve got primary school age kids they shouldn’t be on Facebook for a start and with teenage kids they should be aware of what they’re doing, or limit their time on the computer at least.”

Tech-smart teens outsmart their worried parents [ Herald Sun, by Greg Thom, 22/8/2011]

VICTORIAN parents fear their lack of technological savvy is putting their kids at risk online.

Research shows more than a third of parents of children aged 10-17 admit their offspring’s tech skills exceed their own.

Experts fear the knowledge gap is convincing many parents they are incapable of understanding how their kids might expose themselves to online risks such as cyber-bullying, sexting and ID theft.

The news comes as the Baillieu Government announced an inquiry into the teen sexting explosion and whether state laws were up with technology.

The inaugural Telstra Cyber-Safety Indicator, to be released today, also showed:

MORE than 87 per cent of young people use the internet at least once a day, with almost half spending at least three hours a week on social-networking sites;

SEXTING is a headache for 62 per cent of parents, who are worried about their children sending sexual messages, photos or videos via mobile phone;

HALF of all parents are frustrated much of their kids’ technology use happens “under the radar”, making it hard to monitor;

ONE in five parents have stumbled across their child accessing inappropriate material online; and

MORE than 12 per cent said their child had been bullied or harassed online.

The online survey by Pure Profile of 1255 people Australia-wide found almost a quarter of parents worried about their children posting personal information on the net. Another 15 per cent stressed over who their kids talked to and what they discussed.

Telstra Internet Trust and Safety Officer Darren Kane said it was important for parents to remember they did not need to be experts to keep their kids safe online.

“Parents should approach their child’s development in the online world as they would in the offline world – by teaching them about right and wrong,” he said.

“It takes a combination of social and technical skills to be safe online.”

More than 69 per cent of parents surveyed set rules about personal information their kids could share.

But 15 per cent said they had no rules governing internet use.

Cyber safety expert Robyn Treyvaud said many parents were abrogating their responsibilities by hiding behind ignorance.

Teachers worried as girls go top of the class for cyber-bullying [The Independent, by Richard Garner, 18/4/2011]

Teachers will today call for an investigation into rising levels of poor behaviour among girls in the classroom.

The girls, they argue, are more likely to resort to cyber-bullying – the form of bullying utilising the internet and mobile phones that is worrying school leaders.

A survey by the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) reveals that half the teachers believed girls’ behaviour had got worse during the past two years. One in five thought it was now more challenging than boys.

Teachers interviewed for the survey accused girls of being “sneakier” than boys in the way they misbehaved.

They were also more adept at using modern social media such as Facebook to bully their fellow pupils.

The survey of 859 teachers in both primary and secondary schools and further education colleges said girls’ misbehaviour centred around isolating fellow pupils from a friendship group, spreading rumours and making snide comments.

“Girls spread rumours and fallouts last a long time,” a 34-year-old teacher from Reading told researchers. “Boys tend to sort it out fairly quickly.”

Another teacher drew attention to a rise in the use of social media to bully pupils. “There is a lot of cyber bullying particularly via MSN and Facebook – this is mainly girls,” said the teacher, who is a member of the senior management team of an English secondary school.

The finding follows a one-day strike by teachers at a high school in Lancashire – Darwen High School – earlier this month over pupil behaviour.

Teachers complained that pupils were making videos and taking photographs in class with their smartphones and then posting them on websites such as YouTube.

The teachers were particularly unhappy that senior management did not back them up when they confiscated pupils’ phones.

Today’s motion at the ATL conference calls for more support for teachers in instilling discipline.

One teacher from Weston-super-Mare told researchers that girls were also becoming more violent. “Girls are definitely getting more violent with gangs of girls in school who are getting worse than gangs of boys,”she said.

However, a primary school teacher from Bedfordshire added: “Boys are generally more physical and their behaviour is more noticeable.

“Girls are often sneakier about misbehaving, they often say nasty things which end up disrupting the lesson just as much as the boys as other children get upset and can’t focus on their work.”

The teacher added. “They [the girls] are usually the ones who refuse to comply with instructions.”

The feeling was, though – despite rising levels of aggressive behaviour among girls – that boys were still more likely to show physical aggression. “Staff get ground down daily by the chatting and messing around, which disrupts lessons for other pupils and takes the pleasure out of teaching,” said Mary Bousted, general secretary of ATL.

“Even more worrying is the physical aggression – most often among boys but also among some girls – which puts other pupils and staff at risk.”

The union’s annual conference in Liverpool will today hear calls to carry out an investigation into the number of girls being excluded from school. Delegates will be told it is an increasing problem.

Pregnant, Teen Moms Say They’re Target Of Cyber-Bullying On Facebook [newson6.com, by Dana Hertneky, 12/2/2011]

NewsOn6.com – Tulsa, OK – News, Weather, Video and Sports – KOTV.com |

MUSTANG, Oklahoma — A group of students in Mustang said they are being targeted on Facebook. A page on the social networking site is being used to cyber-bully pregnant teens and teen moms.

The page lists the teens who are either pregnant or are already moms then calls them various names.

“I just don’t see why we were targeted out of everyone, “said Montana Reid, one of the teens named on the site.

The girls say they found out about the page Wednesday afternoon.

“I started texting the girls saying ‘Did you all know about this?’ and they were like ‘No. what are you talking about?’,” said Carmen Hankins, another teen named on the Facebook page.

The girls say the site is upsetting to them.

“The last thing we need is people telling us how awful parents we are and how we messed up forever,” said Gabbi Preslie.

But they said it’s even worse for another teen listed who isn’t pregnant.

That teen posted “Like, this isn’t okay. I’m crying, I’m not…pregnant.”

“She was really upset. She was bawling,” recalled the teens.

A spokesperson for Mustang High School said they were made aware of the page, but it was taken down before they could see it. They say they will keep an eye on the situation to see if it causes conflict at school. But there’s little they can do if the person who made the site did so off school property.

The Mustang Police Department also said there’s nothing they can do about the site either unless it violates state law and right now there is no law against cyber bullying.

Still the girls understand how this can lead to a lot more than hurt feelings.

“I had a friend and he hung himself last weekend, cause of things like this,” said Hankins.

State Senator Andrew Rice has proposed a law this session that would give schools more jurisdiction when it comes to cyber bullying, even if it doesn’t happen on school property.

Bullying: A Growing Trend? [The Quad News, by Christine Keener, 30/1/2011].

Bullying seems to be a rite of passage for the youth of this country, but until recently it hasn’t come to the forefront in the media. Why is this?

Has traditional bullying (which does not include cyber bullying) actually increased or does it just seem that way because of how lawmakers and the media are portraying the situation?

Izzy Kalman, a school psychologist, author of “A Psychological Solution to Bullying” and creator of the anti-bullying website Bullies2Buddies, said bullying is a growing problem because of society’s increased desire to target the problem.

“But the harder you try to make the problem disappear, the worse it gets, and the more time and resources you end up spending to fight it,” Kalman said. “It becomes a never-ending problem that spirals out of control.”

Now though, the government has stepped in. Various state legislatures have proposed new laws which require schools to provide anti-bullying programs, as well as policies to address the growing concern for school safety.

Jane Gross, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist in Hamden, Conn., added that bullying has always been evident.

“When you call attention to something, it increases,” Gross said. “The energy of the media is now being pulled in that direction. People are now just really talking about it.”

She also said the media is negatively affecting bullying and only increases public fear on the issue.

According to Kalman, bullying experts, anti-bullying organizations and psychological researchers are collaborating to promote public awareness, adding that a parent’s fear of bullying has surpassed their fear of drugs.

But even with new laws put in place and the media hysteria surrounding bullying, knowing the ways to stop yourself from being a victim are the key to getting out of this vicious cycle.

Gross said students should know it is not their fault if they are being bullied. She advises students to not talk back to the bully, show little emotion, and not add fuel to the fire.

“Students should report the person to whoever is in authority and reach out to friends,” Gross said. “Students should gather forces to stop this serious problem.”

Kalman said one of the best ways to handle bullying is to adopt intervention plans. Schools can teach “assertiveness training and provide good social skills lessons.”

But will the school’s intervention truly help?

“We could only hope these programs are positive,” Gross said.

Protect your child from cyber bullying [The Daily Telegraph, 27/1/2011]

CYBER bullying is intentional, repeated behaviour by individuals or organisations using online technology to cause distress or humiliation to another individual or to attempt to humiliate, intimidate, control or to otherwise put that person down.

– Cyber bullying takes place by email, internet chat rooms, internet discussion groups or forums, instant messaging, sites such as Facebook, MySpace or Bebo, and mobile phone messaging, video clips and phone calls.4From the moment a child starts using a computer, parents should talk to them about online safety by reminding them that stranger danger is more prolific online than in the real world and that they have no way of knowing the age, gender or motives of people they are talking to online.

– Install anti-virus, spy ware, firewall and filters in the family computer and your child’s laptop. Free filters are available from netalert.gov.au.

– Ensure the family computer stays in an area accessible and visible to all and monitor the sites visited and take an interest in what children are doing online.

– Be alert to any changes in your child’s behaviour ie: spending more time online, a spike in mobile phone usage and bills. Encourage them to talk to you if anybody says or does anything to make them feel uncomfortable.8Regularly visit these websites: schools.nsw.edu.au/news/technology, netalert.gov.au and thinkuknow.org.au.

– If you are aware of school-related bullying, encourage your child to notify a trusted adult at school or notify the school yourself. 10If you are concerned about offensive websites, contact the Australian Communications and Media Authority (acma.gov.au). Report cyber harassment to your local police and your internet service provider or phone service provider, which can block messages or calls from certain senders. For confidential support, call the Net Alert helpline on 1800 880 176. Confidential counselling is available for children and young people from the Kids Help Line on 1800 551 800.

– Kids today spend hours online and technology has taken schoolyard bulling into the stratosphere with the added, sinister element of relative anonymity.

Littlegossip website reopens after bullying complaints [BBCRadio5Live, by Stephen Chittenden, 24/12/2010]

The site has defended itself against the accusations

A website for young people to share gossip has been shut down and then reopened for over-18s only, following protests about cyber-bullying.

Some teachers and parents had alleged Littlegossip.com was being used as a platform for children to post personal and sexual smears against their peers.

The site now says it is for adults only but BBC News has found many schools and their pupils still using it.

Users can post gossip anonymously about people at their college or university.

Other users can then vote on whether the posts are true or false.

However, school pupils have been known to use the site.

‘Racist abuse’

One example about a named boy at a well-known boarding school says: “Please stop taking drugs the whole time, it’s not cool.”

Of a girl at the same school one user has written: “Those thunder thighs chug round school. Stop cheating on your boyfriend and sort out the acne. Not attractive.”

Many posts also contain sexual or racist abuse.

One concerned father, named only as Dave, contacted the BBC to warn other parents about the site.

“It’s cyber-bullying at its worst,” he said. “Seriously, kids are going to take their lives because of this site.”

Dave said his daughter, who attends a college in Surrey, couldn’t believe what was said about her friend.

“She was fascinated by it – but then she saw so much hate on there.”

The school involved has blocked access to the site and said it was “extremely concerned about the malicious potential of this website”.

A spokeswoman added: “We are… frustrated at the difficulties involved in taking effective action against the site itself and against individual posters who remain anonymous.”

Many other schools and organisations have condemned Littlegossip.

The National Association of Head Teachers said it harmed the lives of both teachers and pupils, and has called for it to be closed down.

Emma-Jane Cross from the charity Beatbullying said the site was worrying because “it seems to have the sole purpose of identifying and victimising vulnerable young people” – something she described as “unacceptable”.

She added: “While social networking sites are not intrinsically bad, it is vital that where incidents of bullying and harassment take place online, swift and decisive action is taken to protect our children and young people.

“In this instance, we would invite government and internet service providers to work with us and take collective responsibility to ensure websites like these are taken offline as a matter of urgency.”

Tackle bullying

But Littlegossip said it had introduced measures to fight cyber-bullying.

In an e-mail to BBC News, it said: “Users need to confirm their gossip is about an adult, doesn’t provide personal information such as phone number and is not racist and more.”

“In addition to that we took the important decision to remove all the schools from the site, even if 18 year olds study in those schools.”

The website appeared to shut down for a 24-hour period until Thursday, during which it posted a Facebook announcement that school groups would be removed.

But when it came back online, the site continued to carry sexual and racist abuse, as well as telephone numbers. Several school groups also continued to appear on its pages.

Chief executive of the Independent Schools’ Council, David Lyscom, confirmed that children could still use the site.

“Although it pretends to be for 18-year-old users only, you just click a box and you can get through to the site, he said.

“Some of our schools are still on there.”

The site has been investigated by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (Ceop), which said it had “come out of nowhere.”

A spokesman confirmed Ceop had contacted Littlegossip to advise on child protection, and he advised children not to visit the site as they were likely to see harmful content or experience cyber-bullying.

Cyber-bullying [Gothenburgtimes.com, by Elizabeth Barrett, 4/11/2010]

Parents receive wake-up call about kids’ use of social media

Lincoln attorney speaks out about potential dangers of Internet, cell phones

A sexting incident involving a 16-year-old Sidney girl has led to the arrest of 36-year-old man.

News accounts say the teen sexted nude photographs of herself and engaged in sexually-based conversations with 36-year-old Kenneth Steffens.

The Sidney man was formally charged Friday with possession of child pornography.

“It’s here, it’s happening in Nebraska,” said Lincoln attorney Karen Haase.

Haase, who deals with social media issues regularly, spoke to middle- and high-school students on Oct. 20 in Gothenburg and to parents during a special presentation that evening.

The attorney, who works for Harding & Schultz, spoke about cyber-bullying, sexting and the hidden dangers of social media networks.

“Social networking is an important part of kids’ lives and parents need to be part of that,” Haase said, adding that parents who are not on Facebook need to join.

Facebook is a social network service and website on the Internet which allows people to communicate with each other.

Sexting

She described sexting—a combination of sex and texting—as an act of sending sexually explicit messages or photos electronically, primarily between cell phones.

Although the sexting incident in Sidney happened after her presentation, Haase said in a phone interview Tuesday that it points to the fact that inappropriate use of cell phones and the Internet is on the increase.

In fact, national statistics reveal these percentages for who’s sending sexually suggestive photos:

39% of all teens

37% of girls

40% of boys

48% of teens say they have received sexting photos or messages

Haase shared an incident from Florida in which a girlfriend sent sexually suggestive photos to her boyfriend who forwarded the images to all of his contacts after he became angry with her.

The boy was convicted of distribution of child pornography and will remain on the sex offender registry until he’s 43 years old.

Cyber-bullying—or the use of technology such as a computer or cell phone to engage in deliberate, repeated and hostile behavior by an individual or group with intent to harm others—is also becoming widespread.

Haase shared an example of a conversation that took place through instant messaging.

Divagirl: “Hey loser, watch your back.”

tmt323: “What ru talking about?

Divagirl: “Why don’t you kill yourself while u r ahead?”

tmt323: “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

Divagirl: “Ugly girls like u need to be put in their place.”

According to a 2008 report from the U.S. National Crime Prevention Council, 43% of teens are exposed to cyber-bullying in one form or another.

Yet, only one in 10 kids told their parents.

Haase said students and parents can be sued for cyber-bullying which if often covered by homeowners insurance.

The suit can be for intentional infliction of emotional distress, tortuous interference or for slander.

Haase started giving presentations about the dangers of social media through her work as a school attorney.

“Kids got into trouble and parents didn’t have a clue,” she said. “They don’t realize it’s an area where they need to parent their kids.”

7 Year-Old Girl with Huntington’s Disease Victim of Cyber-Bullying [emaxhealth.com, by Ramona Bates, 12/10/2010].

A 7 year-old girl with Huntington’s Disease is the victim of an extreme case of cyber-bullying.

The young girl, Kathleen Edward, lives in Trenton, Michigan. Her mother, Laura Edward, died of Huntington’s disease last year.

The cyber-bullying has come from her neighbors. MLive.com reports Jennifer Petkov, 33, admitted on camera Thursday night that she used her Facebook account to post disturbing death-related images of Kathleen Edward and her late mother.

Neighbors say the Petkovs built a coffin, put it on their truck and drove past the Edward home, honking the horn.

Cyber-bullying involves the use of information and communication technologies to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behavior by an individual or group, that is intended to harm others.

When asked by a reporter from Detroit television station WJBK why she posted the photos, Jennifer Petkov said without apology, “Personal satisfaction. Because it rubs their a—s raw. Burns their a—s.”

The news of the cyber-bullying has gone viral with backlash from people from around the world posting Facebook, YouTube and Twitter pages of their own attacking Jennifer Petkov. The Petkovs have apologized to the Edward family.

Adults who are bullies lash out at others for the same reason children who are bullies do. Often out of anger, resentment and jealousy. Bullies often lack poor conflict resolution skills, a lack of moral development and the desire to bully.

Click here for information on an Oct. 23 rally supporters are organizing on Kathleen’s behalf.

Huntington’s disease is an inherited, progressive, degenerative disease that causes certain nerve cells in your brain to waste away. As a result, you may experience uncontrolled movements, emotional disturbances and mental deterioration. Most often, signs and symptoms of the disease develop in middle age not in children. When they do occur in children, the disease is more severe and progresses more quickly.

Here’s some links to information to help you prevent this from occurring in your kids – and yourselves:
Cyberbullying.org
SaferInternet.org
Stop Cyberbullying Network

Bullying, Cyber Bullying & Digital Safety Workshops For Primary & Secondary Schools

Tag: cyber-bullying