Strategies to Stop Cyber Crime & Bullying
At a Global Level our need to be adaptive to the changes the Covid brought are epic. That level of Change is going to take a movement to change policy and secure victims from the damages of cybercriminal activities. When a cycle of guilt, shame, or threats cross the line to creating material damage, it should no longer be classified. Pew Research found 41% of Americans have been subject to harassment online, yet only 19% feel law enforcement takes the complaints seriously.
Today, we will touch on elevating the dialogue around cyber bullying through cyber criminal victim assault. During Coronavirus Pandemic we saw increases in Cyber Criminal Scams and student age cyber bullying increases of up to 70%. Regardless of if the victim is institution, corporate business, region, religion, child, family, or individual, the global Cyber Crime Community is still adjusting to the impacts of a post coronavirus community.
The first things we must do is take charge of our life, and take the positive steps to stop the abuse cycle.
How can we handle bullying better? Make no mistake there are elements of crime, so let us stop calling the ritualistic harassment of victims “bullying”. As a COVID Long Haul survivor I have observed the full range of cyber bullying to cyber criminal activity. Some simply did not believe in COVID, so the hospitalization of many people such of myself was offensive to their beliefs. COVID Long haul was challenging enough to find and keep work with the few symptoms that remained, and securing both the income and healthcare to figure out what could support POST COVID Recovery.
Dealing with the challenges of the current state systems- healthcare overwhelmed with COVID, uninsured patients like me increased without income due to COVID economy. Social Media overwhelmed with political and social threats, fake news, politics, and not able to define the new realm of safety issues from COVID related Cybercrime issues. International and global systems overwhelmed with the sheer volume of new cybercrime reports, to a point where the ones that got action are the ones who can hire lawyers to make it happen.
- “Cyber bullying” being those who believe COVID is a hoax, and therefore they call me a fraud or a faker. (its their opinion, it’s my reality, we don’t see eye to eye on this topic.)
- “Cyber bullying crosses the line to criminal when the bully can not let go of the difference. They escalate harassment, engage others, general attack from other accounts or social medial platforms, phone, text and email.
- Cyber Criminal harassments is the escalation taking on the form of deliberate torture, threats and blackmail change the surface of the attack. It is no longer a disagreement of opinion, its a statement of intent to cause harm or damage to the victims (public humiliation, defamation, loss of job, death, sickness, blackmail money, theft of property, assets, etc).
Tips for Adult Victims of Cybercriminal Bullying
Psychology wrote a great article titled “Adult Bullying is a thing too“, with strategies for how to manage it.
- Take a stand that changes the conditions
- Document everything that happened to determine if the bullying is escalating. If it is, you have a document ready to engage authorities with.
- Do not let fear, guilt, shame, or sorrow diminish your voice. Talk about it with trusted friends or family with a fair and reasonable response to unfair and unreasonable bullying or harassment attack.
- Analyze the present state and set new boundaries, reactions and management strategies.
- Try not to take it personally. Practice patient compassion, with firm resolve.
Global Cyber Crime Reference
Cyber Criminal Threat Management Worldwide
INTER-POL is the short name for International Criminal Police Organization, an inter-governmental organization consisting of 194 member countries world wide. They partner with police worldwide, to make the world a safer place by networking cyber sharing and access of data on crimes and criminals, offering in addition, technical and operational support in resolving complex cyber criminal activity.
- Bangladesh: Cyber Police Center or Police Cyber Support for Women
- Canada: Report a cyber incident – Canadian Centre for Cyber Security
- India: How to File a Cyber Crime Complaint in India
- Japan: Report a fraud in Japan – Japan Anti Fraud Organization
- Singapore: How to Report Cybercrime and Cyber Attacks in Singapore
- United Kingdom: Reporting fraud and cyber crime | Action Fraud
- United States: Cyber Crime. How to protect yourself how to report cyber crime. Internet Crime Complaint Center
Please add other global threat management links in the bottom, and this reference will be updated periodically with all validated leads.
Statistical Impact of Cybercriminal Activity
Cyber- Bullying Statistics:
In the United States, over 60% of Teenagers have experienced some degree of cyberbullying or cyber harassments. Keeping cyberbullying quiet, is where a host of problems start. for those who bully, those who see it, and those who are being bullied. Inaction, silence, and letting it blow over is never the right solution.
- 15% of cyber-bullying victims preferred to keep the issue a secret
- The risk of suicide is 2 times greater for cyberbullied students
- 37% of cyber-bullied victims develop social anxiety
Most, nearly 60% of children will try to support or stand up for someone who is being cyberbullied. My children were part of that statistic. They had seen first hand the difficulties of cyberbullying, as in their schools, several of their classmates committed suicide as a result of Cyber-bullying.
Statistically when students are aware and feel empowered, it provides a healthy environment for intervention that is making a difference. “Student Peer advocacy” works well because students are closer at school than adults to see what is happening. Positive peers influence is powerful. When a peer student tells someone to stop bullying, in many cases, it has much more impact than an adult giving the same advice according to study by pacer.org/bullying/ resources/peer-advocacy.asp
There is much our schools, teachers, parents, and friends can do to make a difference. It starts with awareness and action. The problem is observing or sensing something is wrong and doing nothing. The problem is not just the victims. Bullying is an act of social aggression where inaction hurts more than “just ignoring it”.
Someone who bullies without intervention, may escalate violent and other risky behaviors into adulthood. Some of the common risks include: Abuse of alcohol and or drugs, Get into fights, vandalization of property, criminal convictions and traffic citations as adults. Someone who does not get the proper support in youth, may continue a patter of abusive behavior with their romantic partners, spouses, or children
Someone who has disabilities and chronic diseases, face double the risk of being bullied. Students who have chronic illness or disabilities face a 66% risk of cyberbullying, compared to the 25% of general students impacted by cyberbullying. With proactive measures by student peers, teachers, and parents, all children have the ability to face their challenges, to rise above cyberbullying and persevere.
Cyber Bullying as a Crime: Definitions List
- Astroturfing: The dissemination or amplification of abusive content that appears to arise organically through social engineered, coordinated (often using multiple fake accounts) spread- whether by an individual, interest group, political party, or organization.
- Cross-platform harassment: a coordinated and deliberately deployed multiple social media cross platform communications, taking advantage social media’s inability to moderate threatening content across all sites.
- Cyber-bullying: Cyberbullying 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. Some bullying actions can fall into criminal categories, such as harassment, hazing, or assault.
- Cyber- harassment: Cyber-harassment is beyond “bullying” or being teased. Cyber-harassment represents repeated behavior that targeted to humiliate, control or scare the victim.
- Cyber Mob Attacks: A large group of abusers organized to launch collective attacks on a target through a barrage of threats, slurs, insults, and other abusive tactics. (also known as “Dogpiling”)
- Cyber-stalking: A prolonged and repeated use of abusive behaviors online with intention “to kill, injure, harass, intimidate, and or place under surveillance, all with intent to kill, injure, harass, or intimidate” the target. Stalking involves continuous following around, leaving messages on mail, phone or online social media, with intent of making them feel scared to be ignored.
- Deepfake: “a form of artificial intelligence called deep learning” to produce make manufactured images, audio, and/or video that appear real so as to give the appearance that someone has said or done something they haven’t.
- Dogpiling: A large group of abusers organized to launch collective attacks on a target through a barrage of threats, slurs, insults, and other abusive tactics. (also known as “Cyber Mob Attacks”)
- Dogwhistling: A “call” for dogpiling by using code words or symbols with a double (coded) meaning that is abusive or harmful, sometimes to signal a group of online abusers to join an attack on the specified target
- Doxxing: “Extortion tactic for “dropping documents as a revenge tactic. Involves the theft and publication of another’s sensitive personal information online such as home address, email, phone number, social security number, personal photos, videos, information, etc.—to harass, intimidate, extort, stalk, or steal the identity of a target.
- Hacking: Unauthorized intrusion into a device or network, or filesystem, hacking is often carried out with the intention to attack, harm, or incriminate another individual by stealing their data, violating their privacy, or infecting their devices with viruses. Hacking used to perform illegal activities or intimidate a target, is a cybercrime.
- Hashtag Poisoning: Similar to Dogwhistling, this involves the creation of an abusive hashtag—or the hijacking of an existing hashtag—that is then leveraged to ignite support from associated cyber mob to encourage them to join in attacks on a target or topic.
- Hateful Speech: Verbal or Written (Social) Expression which attacks a specific aspect of a person’s identity, (may include derogatory messaging about race, ethnicity, gender identity, religion, sexual orientation, disability) meant to incite a target or topic and attack instead the person with a barrage of negative character or attributes.
- Nonconsensual Intimate Images: Nonconsensual pornography is “the distribution of private, sexually-explicit photos, images, or videos, of a target or targets of individuals, without their consent (also known as Revenge Porn)
- Online Impersonation: Involves the creation of a hoax social media account, to continue harassments, often after blocking, and sometimes using the target’s name and/or photo, to post offensive or inflammatory statements to defame, discredit, or instigate further abuse. A harasser can also impersonate someone the target knows in order to cause harm.
- Phishing: Involves a compelling online scam that begins from with some form of troubling communication—an email, a text, a Whatsapp message—whose aim is to trick you into doing something—usually clicking on a link or opening an attachment, which may automatically download a virus onto your device or lead you to enter private information, like login details, which could then be used to gain control over your online accounts, impersonate you, or sell your info to others for further victimization.
- Revenge Porn: Nonconsensual pornography is “the distribution of private, sexually-explicit photos, images, or videos, of a target or targets of individuals, without their consent(also known as nonconsensual intimate images)
- Sextortion: A form of black mail in which the abuser collects or creates the appearance of nonconsensual intimate images of the target threatens “to expose a nude or sexually explicit image in order to get a person to do something.”
- Threats: A statement with intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action” against a target such as torture, death threats, threats of physical violence, and sexual violence.
- Unsolicited Pornography or Sexualization: Involves the sending sexually explicit “unwelcome sexual requests, comments, content, photos, images and videos to a target
- Zoom-bombing: Hijacking a virtual meeting with intent to discredit or disrupt communication through the sharing of text, video, or audio… commonly referred to as “raiding” or “bombing”. Zoom-bombing cybercrimes are conducted for a variety of reasons, including disruption of business activities, discrediting targets, or conducting identity-based attacks individuals, groups or businesses.
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