A survey has been conducted of 577 students aged between 12 and 18 in Galway. The study found that 85% say cyber bullying is a major issue for young people and 22% have been subject to online bullying, while 50% know someone who has been cyber-bullied.
A majority, 80%, did not think that enough was being done to tackle the issue of cyberbullying.
The research was conducted for Galway West Labour TD, Derek Nolan and Labour MEP candidate for Midlands North-West, Senator Lorraine Higgins.
The spread of cyberbullying coincides with the digital revolution, most recently the popularity of mobile devices such as smartphones, now owned by over 60pc of Irish teenagers.
Cyberbullying is a more insidious form of traditional bullying because it allows the perpetrator to remain anonymous, while the use of technology makes it difficult for the target to escape it.
The recent survey carried out for the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals (NAPD) provides disturbing evidence of how the problem is growing, despite ongoing efforts to combat it.
Among the worrying findings is the almost doubling in the proportion of pupils who engaged in cyberbullying, when compared with similar research a year ago. It found that 9pc, or almost one in 10, admitted to cyberbullying – up from 5pc in 2013.
Meanwhile, 16pc said they have been the target of online or text bullying – a rise of one-third on the previous year.
The survey highlights how parents may not be fully aware of the extent to which the children are suffering, with only 12pc reporting that a child of theirs has been a victim of cyberbullying.
It also found that 26pc of parents monitor their children’s activities online on a daily basis, while 15pc never monitor.
MORALE
The older the parent, the less likely they are to keep a check, with 64pc of under 35-year-olds monitoring their children’s online activity weekly, reducing to 40pc among the over-45s.
NAPD director Clive Byrne described the growing prevalence of cyberbullying as “quite disturbing”, adding that the annual survey – conducted in January and February among 1,000 parents and young people by Amarach Research – provided a valuable insight into the ever-changing attitudes and prevalence of cyberbullying among second-level pupils.
The findings are consistent with research by Dublin City University, which found that 14pc of students reported that they had been cyberbullied, while 8pc admitted cyberbullying. Another survey by NUI Maynooth reported that 17pc of students were victims of cyberbullying, while 9pc admitted carrying it out.
Mr Byrne said cyberbullying posed a clear and present threat to the collective morale of schools. He added the survey clearly indicated that the less parents monitored their children’s online activity, the less they knew.
Arising from the findings, the NAPD will shortly make a formal submission to the Government’s Internet Content Advisory Group, which will include a recommendation for a National Cyberbullying Policy, encompassing government departments and public sector agencies.
NAPD is also seeking increased training for parents, particularly older parents, and a module on cyberbullying as part of the Social, Personal and Health Education (SPHE) curriculum, to be taught at junior and senior cycles.
And the principals also want the Department of Education to develop a standardised template to allow schools to self-evaluate the effectiveness of existing cyberbullying initiatives within their school.
The alleged online bully didn’t stop with the social media accounts, which included Facebook and Google+. The sisters did a simple search of their names and “were shocked to find numerous places where photos of themselves had been posted to adult photo-sharing websites,” the charges against Hoehne say.
Anchorage Police Department investigator tracked the man through IP addresses, which identify how computers are communicating over a network, and emails. All digital evidence trails led to the disgruntled roommate, a man who allegedly had an unhealthy sexual fixation involving the victim.
Charges filed on New Year’s Eve detail the high-speed Internet chase that started in late August, when the victim told police that Hoehne had downloaded photos of her, some nude, from her computer without permission and used them to make the fake accounts. She said Hoehne also posted ads claiming she was an escort or prostitute and “enjoyed different explicit sex acts with strangers,” the charges say. She said her sister suffered similar online harassment.
What the victim experienced is hard to define. She was harassed online. Her reputation is in question. It’s a type of cyberbullying taken to the extreme.
Alaska law protects against criminals intent on harassing or annoying another person, according to the harassment statute’s language. One section of the law says the criminal charge is applicable if a person “makes an anonymous or obscene telephone call, an obscene electronic communication, or a telephone call or electronic communication that threatens physical injury or sexual contact.” A crime has been committed if someone “publishes or distributes electronic or printed photographs, pictures, or films that show the genitals, anus, or female breast of the other person or show that person engaged in a sexual act.”
But data collected on cyberbullying focuses on middle and high school students, an age when many teens start to define themselves and establish their digital identities. One of the leading entities gathering such data is the Cyberbullying Research Center. According to a summary of its research from 2004-2013, 24 percent of middle and high school students have been a victim of the online form of bullying, generally defined as someone sending electronic messages in an intimidating or threatening manner.
The center’s site offers advice for adults who fall victim to cyberbullying but no statistics. Among the tips: don’t retaliate in a similar fashion, contact law enforcement and get an attorney.
Another organization that fights online harassment through education is WHO@, Working to Halt Online Abuse. The organization started in 1997, when online chat rooms and instant messengers were growing in popularity.
Still, it doesn’t track cases of adult cyberbullying. Instead, it collects cyberstalking statistics, online harassment that may include sending threatening emails. It found that 36 percent of cyberstalking victims are 18-30 years old, 38 percent are 30-40 years old and 26 percent are 41 or older. And 80 percent of those victims are female; 63 percent of the victims had a prior relationship with their harasser, according to the group’s data.
Co-director of the Cyberbullying Research Center Jonathan Patchin told the Washington Post in October that adult harassment occurs far more often than people realize. It’s visible in vile comments on sites like Twitter and comment threads under online news articles, he said.
Hoehne and the victim lived together for a few years. That’s until summer 2011, when the two allegedly fell out when she confronted Hoehne and his family about numerous pieces of underwear she found hidden in his bed, the charges say.
She moved out shortly after the fight and has had very little contact with him since, the woman told police.
But in August, the woman’s sister brought the fake Facebook accounts to her attention. The page shared posts of nude photos, some of herself that’d been stolen from her computer. She later described her former roommate as computer savvy and said when they lived together, she asked Hoehne to do some work on her computer. The victim also said Hoehne was aware of the photos but did not have permission to view, let alone share the pictures.
The sister quickly deleted her Facebook account after its discovery but Hoehne’s former roommate left hers open. After finding more sites and more photos — some of the sisters’ faces superimposed over other women having sex, with captions like “a couple of craigslist dates,” “working the bars in downtown Anchorage” and “(victims’ first and last name) likes to let people watch” — she went to police.
All the investigator had to do to call up the pictures was Google the sisters’ names, the charges say. Adding variations of “Alaska” and “Anchorage” got numerous hits on them.
A look at the fake Google+ account found references to the victim’s family and personal life, details only Hoehne would be aware of, the charges say.
Search warrants from multiple accounts were granted, and the officer connected the profiles to Hoehne’s personal emails, which also allegedly had stored photos of the sisters. All together, the officer documented 372 separate posts that actually were the victim or purported to be one of the sisters.
Hoehne faces two charges, the first of which is actually a second-degree theft charge. He has been accused of holding onto the victim’s clothing, jewelry and underwear, as well as a handheld camcorder, valued together at $2,000. It’s alleged he refuses to give it back. The theft charge is a felony.
The 371 harassment counts stem from the hundreds of lewd images posted online, and they are misdemeanors.
Hoehne is in custody in Anchorage on $10,000 bail.
The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) and anti-bullying charity BeatBullying have urged young people to speak out against cyberbullying, after a teenage schoolgirl was found dead in her home, following a series of abusive messages on the Ask.fm website.
Hannah Smith, 14, was found hanged at her home in Lutterworth, Leicestershire, yesterday. Messages found on her Ask.fm account show how trolls told her to “drink bleach”, “go get cancer” and “go die”. Her parents are now calling for Ask.fm to be closed down before any more tragedies occur.
Commenting on the news, Peter Wanless, CEO of the NSPCC, described this as a tragic case, where Hannah felt like she had no other option but to end her life.
“The cruel nature of cyberbullying allows perpetrators to remain anonymous and hide behind their screens. This is something that must be tackled before it gets out of hand. We must ensure young people have the confidence to speak out against this abuse, so that they don’t feel isolated and without anywhere to turn,” Wanless told the Telegraph.
He added that, over the last year, ChildLine has carried out 4,507 counselling sessions with young people who were concerned about cyberbullying – an 87 per cent rise in contacts about this concern from the previous year.
“Young people are feeling increasingly desperate, and in many cases suicidal, as a result of the abusive comments they are victim to,” he said.
Ask.fm has been heavily criticised by anti-bullying charities because it allows users to post anonymous comments or questions – often of a sexual or insulting nature – on the pages of children as young as 13.
Some child safety experts have even described it as a “stalker’s paradise” and an online petition has been set up demanding action is taken.
However, simply closing down individual sites is not in itself an answer to the problem of cyberbullying.
The NSPCC said that parents need to talk to their children about the dangers posed by the internet, and tell them what they should do if they become worried or concerned. They should also explain that anything shared online or by mobile phone could end up being seen by anyone.
Any computer used by a child should be in a place where the whole family can see it, not out of sight in a bedroom, and parents should also use filtering software to block inappropriate sites, said the NSPCC.
Meanwhile, Campaign group BeatBullying has put together a list of five tips to help children stay safe online:
1. Save and print out any bullying messages, posts, pictures or videos you receive. Make a note of the dates and times, along with any details you have about the sender’s ID and the URL.
2. Always report anything abusive you see online to the site concerned. Flag it, report it, or talk to someone about it.
3. Never respond or retaliate, as this can just make things worse. Instead, block any users that send you nasty messages.
4. Think very carefully before posting photos of yourself online. Remember that once your picture is online, anyone can download it and share it or even change it.
5. And lastly, don’t pass on cyberbullying videos or messages about other people. Don’t just ignore it. If you see cyberbullying going on, report it and offer your support.
Incidences of cyberbullying among teenagers in Ireland are among the highest in Europe, according to a new report.
A quarter of nine- to 16-year-olds experienced some form of bullying, both online and offline. Levels of bullying in Ireland are above average compared with the 25 other countries surveyed as part of Safer Internet Day, a global initiative to promote a safer internet for all users, especially young people.
Irish teenagers recorded four times the level of lasting damage from bullying than the European average, with 8 per cent reporting lasting trauma. The European average is 2 per cent.
More than two-thirds of the parents (68 per cent) did not know their children were bullied, while just 29 per cent did know.
Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan and Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn both turned up at this morning’s launch of two initiatives – the Watch your Space public awareness campaign on cyber-bullying, and a new Garda primary schools programme module, Connect with Respect, which deals with online bullying.
Mr Callinan said young people are “extremely vulnerable”, and that gardaí intend to go around to schools to raise awareness of cyberbullying and to offer support to students who are feeling bullied.
Mr Quinn said the level of awareness of cyberbullying was much higher than had been the case, partially as a result of a number of high-profile tragedies involving teenagers targeted in such a fashion.
He said he was “absolutely committed” to addressing all forms of bullying and was providing a budget of €500,000 to fund an action plan on the issue.
Social media sites like Facebook are regularly being used to abuse teachers, says a survey.
Of the 1,500 teachers who responded, 42% reported things like insulting comments, allegations of inappropriate behaviour and having photos passed around the internet.
One 27-year-old teacher told Newsbeat how she fell into depression and had to go on medication because of the way she was targeted online.
The problem of cyberbullying can affect any group, says Richard Piggin, deputy chief executive of Beatbullying.
“It doesn’t matter whether you’re 13 or 30,” he said. “The behaviour is still the same and the consequences are still the same.
“It can still hurt just as much and have an impact on confidence and if it takes place in school, your willingness to want to go to school.”
Richard says there’s a big gap between what many people think is acceptable online, compared with the real world.
He says cyberbullying often isn’t taken as seriously as face-to-face bullying and that help can be hard to find.
“Sometime it’s not taken down, sometimes the support networks aren’t in place,” he said.
“Schools are unclear and perhaps don’t have guidance or the confidence to know what they can do and whether they can act.”
He also reckons social networking sites should be quicker to take down cases of online bullying.
CyberMentors, a bullying support website, recommends the following:
Top tips
The recent discovery of state Rep. Jesse White’s multiple online personalities making anonymous attacks on his constituents cast a light on the dark reality of the Internet and cyberbullying.
The anonymity provided by the Internet oftentimes can be hurtful to those being targeted, but even vicious attacks aren’t necessarily illegal because they’re typically protected by free speech.
Mary Jo Podgurski, director of Washington Hospital Teen Outreach, said it typically is the product of someone who is “not courageous enough” to have a face-to-face disagreement with an opponent.
“It’s a very easy and anonymous way to be a bully,” Podgurski said. “People do really hurt each other. It’s a very vicious cycle.”
In her experiences, she’s noticed young people usually stick to sending nasty text messages or posting attacks through Facebook. It’s the adults who are more comfortable with anonymous comments through Internet message boards or even posting lewd photos of an ex.
“It’s an underhanded way to slander someone and hit them hard,” she said. “You can make specific insults, and they don’t think it’s traceable.”
And, in most cases, it is very difficult for average people who are being attacked on Internet to find their cyberbully.
All Internet users leave behind a cybersignature that can be traced to a computer or Internet provider, but unlocking that information can be nearly impossible for the average person.
When a television station first reported that White was behind anonymous attacks on a Marcellus Shale website, the Observer-Reporter staff began investigating whether his alter egos also left comments on the newspaper’s website. It took hours to match White’s Internet protocol address from his verified account to two messages he posted under the pseudonym of Janice Gibson earlier this year.
In most cases, though, people must utilize the courts to reveal information, through which investigators can subpoena Internet records.
North Strabane Township police Detective John Wybranowski handles the cybercomplaints in the department and said they’re seeing more cases involving harassment on Facebook than anything else. He said it’s often difficult to determine if a crime has been committed since what a person is permitted to say under free speech laws must be taken into consideration.
“A threat of violence we have to take very seriously,” he said.
Although the district attorneys in Washington and Dauphin counties are investigating White’s comments, it’s unknown if he broke any laws with his online antics. Prosecuting such crimes can be difficult, Wybranowski said, adding many police departments don’t have the training or resources to handle these investigations.
First, an officer needs to obtain a court order to obtain the Internet Protocol number identifying the computer a suspect used to post the information. Next, a search warrant needs to be signed by a judge giving police permission to enter a home and seize electronic devices.
“The amount of work needed to investigate cyberbullying is phenomenal,” said Wybranowski.
That adds another level of difficulty, he said, because there can be four or five devices in a home, and each would need to undergo a forensic examination.
“Then you have to resolve that all the way back to determine who did the posting,” he said, adding that it’s often easier to extract a confession, especially when more than one person has access to computers in a residence.
“In Pennsylvania, the laws need to catch up with the technology, and it’s changing so fast,” he said.
There are various bills snaking their way through the state Legislature that would deal with cyberbullying or target online impersonators.
House Bill 764 would make it illegal for someone to use another person’s name to create a website, post messages on social networking sites, open an online account or send electronic messages. Ironically, White voted in favor of this bill just three weeks before his online personalities were revealed.
Joseph Schwerha, an associate professor of business law and technology at California University of Pennsylvania, said it might be difficult to enact laws and enforce them when free speech is so important for our society. He pointed to other countries that crack down on radical beliefs many would consider offensive but must be allowed here.
“We’ve always protected speech at the cost of illegitimate opinions,” Schwerha said. “There are parts of the world where there are hate speech laws, which we protect in the U.S.”
But Schwerha, who has worked on cybercrimes and online identity theft for two decades, said the anonymity of the Internet sometimes brings out the worst in people. What he found most interesting about White’s situation is that he created an army of faux online personalities to support his opinions and push forward his agenda.
“When people don’t have to reveal their true identity, they seem to say or do things they wouldn’t otherwise because they can shield their reputation,” Schwerha said.
Online message boards attached to news articles offer readers an outlet to express themselves, but also an opportunity to launch attacks against their foes.
When the Observer-Reporter redesigned its website in November, Editor Liz Rogers said they hoped the new commenting feature would engage readers and produce energetic conversations. Instead, she said, it spawned a “mob mentality” of nasty comments that were nearly impossible to police by the staff.
“It degenerated into a bunch of name-calling and insults,” Rogers said. “It just got downright nasty.”
The newspaper pulled the plug on the commenting feature in March after one reader – not Jesse White – continuously posted lewd comments and personal attacks aimed at staff members despite attempts to block him from the site. Rogers said the newspaper could eventually restore the message board, but only if it can implement a system that requires readers to register using their real names and email addresses.
“We were extremely disappointed about how it turned out,” Rogers said. “It wasn’t constructive. We hoped the dialogue would be something that would benefit both the community and staff.”
Podgurski isn’t surprised that the comments quickly turned ugly. She pointed to a recent online cereal advertisement that featured a biracial family. Despite receiving many supportive comments, it had to be censored because of the unrelenting attacks by a few users.
“Sometimes they’re just so flat out disrespectful that you don’t want to post them,” Podgurski said. “We’re suppose to have the Golden Rule.”
Ultimately, she thinks that the online discourse displayed by Internet users is just an indication of the times.
“They see a lot of anger in the political theater and on the media. I think it’s cultural,” Podgurski said. “We have a cultural problem with respect, and cyberbullying is a part of that.”
Staff writer Scott Beveridge contributed to this story.
He was commenting after it emerged that four fifth-year students have been expelled from a Dublin secondary school for running a Facebook page that carried malicious comments about at least two teachers, including remarks of a sexual nature.
One of the students expelled from Oatlands College in Stillorgan is a son of independent Wexford TD Mick Wallace.
When contacted yesterday by the Irish Examiner, the school did not make any comment. “It’s the policy of Oatlands College not to make any comment concerning any student in the college,” said deputy principal Caroline Garrett.
The Facebook page was open for less than 24 hours in mid-March, and more than 20 other students who hit the ‘Like’ button on the page served a Saturday detention after it was found by a staff member. The student who set it up and three others who were listed as administrators of the page were initially suspended for 20 school days.
However, following an investigation, they were expelled after a board meeting this week. Their parents can appeal the decision under a procedure open to them to refer the expulsions to a committee to be set up by the Department of Education.
Mr Quinn said the bullying of teachers is quite a problem, although he would not talk about the incident when asked by RTÉ News yesterday.
“I would say it is an unusual occurrence and obviously I can’t comment on the details of this particular case,” he said.
“The teacher unions and management bodies have indicated to me that in some cases this can be a two-way street and pressure on teachers can be enormous in some areas.”
The issue of cyberbullying was a significant topic at the Anti-Bullying Forum hosted by Mr Quinn’s department.
Mark Caffrey, the equality officer of the Irish Second-level Students’ Union, said the department needed to provide all schools with a clear policy on the use of social networking sites by students and staff.
“I believe the best way to reduce bullying of staff online is to have zero interaction between staff and students on sites like Facebook and Twitter that have anything to do with non-academic items.
“Students must be given advice about proper usage of sites, or reminded of how to act properly online.”
It was halfway through her first year at secondary school that Georgia Woods started to be bullied. “I’d originally been really popular,” she says, recalling the events of three years ago, “but just after my 12th birthday, these girls started calling me stuck-up and a snob.” The name calling got worse, and gradually Georgia was ostracised by the rest of the class and eventually the whole school year group. But, as if that wasn’t bad enough, things were about to take an even more pernicious turn as the bullying went online.
“At first I didn’t know about it. My mum had let me join [the social networking site] Bebo as long as she held the password and updated my profile,” says Georgia. “She knew I had been having arguments with friends at school so she
clicked on one of the people on my wall and it went through to a page about how much everyone hated me. I felt really bad. I thought, ‘Why are they saying that?’ But finally I started to believe that what they said was true. The hardest bit was that I was so alone.”
Online petitions and endless vicious emails followed; Georgia became
withdrawn and stopped eating “because they kept calling me fat and ugly”. Things came to a head when she was away on a school trip and her parents decided to redecorate her bedroom. While moving the furniture around, they found a torn-out page from her diary in which she had detailed an attempt to hang herself.
Georgia had become another victim of cyberbullying, a way of humiliating, distressing and harassing a target using digital means. This can range from
bombarding them with threatening or insulting text messages and emails to more sophisticated means of intimidation: hacking into someone’s social network account and uploading false information on their profile (known as Facebook-raping or “fraping”) is common, as is setting up pages dedicated to a hate campaign against a particular person.
And Georgia certainly was not alone — the anti-bullying campaign group Beatbullying estimates that 30 per cent of 11-16 year-olds have been cyberbullied, and girls are more than twice as likely to be targeted than boys. Shockingly, since 2009, when the organisation set up a cyber-mentoring site to support and help those who had been cyberbullied, they have had a million young people contact them.
“Even children as young as nine or 10 have Facebook pages,” says Sherry Adhami, of Beatbullying. “We need to have early intervention and we need to understand that it isn’t just a schools issue. We need to educate the whole community about what happens.”
To those who have not experienced it, cyberbullying can sound less serious than other forms of bullying: it is not, for example, physical. Yet experts believe that it can be psychologically more insidious, as it is so persistent and leaves its targets without a safe haven.
“So many children are constantly connected to their peer group — they spend a lot of time on sites such as Facebook, they sleep with their mobiles under their pillow,” says Will Gardner, CEO of Childnet International, an organisation that aims to make the internet safer for children.
“A bully can reach their target 24/7 — victims cannot get away from it.”
Moreover, the target may not even know who is instigating the bullying. “The bully could be anonymous, which is very distressing,” says Gardner, “and the target may not know who else is in on the joke – who is laughing at it.”
The sheer reach of the internet also means that a bullying campaign can spread beyond a child’s immediate social group to people in other cities and other countries, adding to the feeling of isolation.
Childnet has produced a film — Let’s Fight it Together — that has been shown in schools to get across the effects that cyberbullying can have on its victims.
Surprisingly, Gardner says, cyberbullies aren’t always aware of the distress their actions can cause. “We do come across people saying, ‘It was just a joke, it didn’t mean anything,’ ” he says. “Technology is bringing us closer together but there is still a distance. I might send you something I think is very funny, but you don’t – and I can’t see your reaction.”
Surprisingly, this was the reaction of Georgia Woods’s tormentors. Never having come across cyberbullying before, Georgia’s parents were initially uncertain how to respond to events, other than to delete Georgia’s Bebo page. But her mother, Sarah-Jane, was galvanised into action when she found out about Georgia’s suicide attempt.
She contacted the school, who were very supportive, and arranged for Georgia to receive counselling through Beatbullying. Following an appearance on Newsround in which Georgia talked about being bullied, one of the girls involved approached her and said that she had no idea that what they were doing had upset her so much.
Remarkably, Georgia has become friends with five of the former bullies and she is now one of Beatbullying’s cyber-mentors, offering confidential support to other targets of bullying at school and online. “I think,” she says with astonishing magnanimity, “we needed to move forward. I don’t like to dwell on the negative.”
What to do
Targets should talk to someone — ideally a parent or teacher. Thanks to campaigns by Beatbullying and Childnet, among others, many schools are very well-informed about cyberbullying and will have policies in place to deal with it.
Keep the texts, emails and website addresses that are included in the bullying as, unlike other forms of bullying, they provide hard evidence of what has taken place and digital footprints that can link them to the perpetrators.
Report any abuse on a social networking site to the moderator – most sites have a “report” button to make this easy. Keep a log of any incidents.
Parents should discuss internet use with their children and gauge ways of working with them to keep them safe on the internet.
Childnet’s site www.digizen.org has resources for schools, parents and children to encourage good digital citizenship. Beatbullying’s cyber-mentor site is www.cybermentors.org.uk.
A NSW school whose students participated in a Facebook site used for cyber-bullying has threatened to expel students under 13 who are using the social networking site.
In an email to parents the principal of Northern Beaches Christian School, Stephen Harris, warned that students registered on Facebook and under the social network’s age limit of 13 would have their enrolment reviewed.
Either children had lied about their age or their parents had helped them join Facebook, he said. ”Let me be very clear – it is an immense parenting mistake to allow for either to happen,” Mr Harris wrote in the email sent on Tuesday.
Yesterday the Herald reported that thousands of Sydney students from various schools had joined websites on which teenagers had been subjected to malicious sexual slander and cyber-bullying.