Cyberbullying: A virtual offense with real consequences

T. S. Sathyanarayana Rao, Deepali Bansal, and Suhas Chandran

Technology, as we know, is a double-edged sword, where the users are continuously
balancing between the risks and opportunities it offers. It is no longer just a cliché: we really
are all connected, 24/7, no matter where in the world, we are mere one click away from our
families, co-workers, classmates, idols, mentors, neighbors, and even strangers. On one side,
the Internet has made the world a much smaller place full of opportunities to thrive for people
with minimal resources along with bringing awareness to important sociopolitical movements
and acting as a platform for fundraising for many noble causes; on the other side, it has
exposed vulnerable people to a deep dark world of web and bullying while sitting safely in
the vicinity of their homes.
A popular report by a US market research company in 2015[1] suggests that, at the time,
there were more mobile devices on the planet than people –8.6 billion devices versus 7.3
billion people. And by the end of 2018, the number of mobile devices in world will exceed 12
billion – an average of nearly 2 devices per user. This rapid rise of electronic-based
communication during the past decade has dramatically changed the social interactions,
especially among teenagers. Adolescents are moving from using the Internet as an “extra” in
everyday communication to using it as the “primary” mode of communication. This shift
from face-to-face communication to online communication has created many unique and
potentially harmful dynamics for social relationships – one such dynamic has recently been
explored in the literature as cyberbullying.
Cyberbullying is defined by Smith et al. as an “aggressive, intentional act carried out by a
group or individual, using electronic forms of contact, repeatedly and over time against a
victim who cannot easily defend himself or herself.”[2] Most definitions of bullying rely
upon three criteria; intent to harm, imbalance of power, and repetition of the act.
Cyberbullying also can happen accidentally. The impersonal nature of text messages, instant
messages, and e-mails makes it very hard to detect the sender's tone – one person's joke could
be another's hurtful insult. However, a repeated pattern is rarely accidental. In case of
cyberbullying, this becomes relatively easy, where the power of one click is immense and
increases the audience by thousands, thus increasing the humiliation and impact of bullying
exponentially. The scope of cyberbullying is vast, in terms of means as well as content. It
includes bullying through text messages, phone calls, e-mails, instant messengers, social
media platforms, or in chat rooms. It varies from posting hurtful words, derogatory
comments, posting fake information on public forums or blogs, hacking accounts for personal
vendetta to rape or death threats. It can be as ruinous as revenge porn, which is posting
sexually explicit images or videos of a person on the Internet, typically by a former sexual
partner, without the consent of the subject and in order to cause them distress or
embarrassment. The impact of such acts can be catastrophic, especially for young adults, who
feel so embarrassed and humiliated that they cannot imagine surviving the next morning, and
end up taking extreme steps which include harm to self and occasionally, others. It deeply
reflects the real-world problems arising out of the virtual cyberspace. No longer limited to
schoolyards or street corners, it has now moved to WhatsApp, Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook,
etc., where online polls are conducted to bodyshame the victim and groups are made to
spread false rumours or share morphed pictures and videos, to a rather vast audience with the
power of the Internet, which would not have been so easily possible in the physical world
otherwise. Cyberbullying also differs from traditional bullying in offering potential
anonymity to the bully and difficulty in identifying the victim. This combined with the
obvious lack of monitoring and regulation in cyberspace makes the issue more intricate and
strenuous to address.
On the basis of their online behavior, people can be categorized as cyber victim, cyber bully,
and cyber victim/bully. The possible adverse effects of cyberbullying can be physical,
psychological, or in academic performance, and these are most pronounced for the cyber
bully/victim category.[3] Higher rates of depression and anxiety are noted among cyber
victims along with refusal to school and declining academic performance. These students are
also found to be more prone to report headache, stomach ache, bed wetting, and various other
psychosomatic complaints. The type of cyberbullying tends to differ among both genders;
girls are more likely to post mean comments online, while boys are more likely to post
hurtful pictures or videos online.[4] As postulated by the USA-based Cyberbullying Research
Centre, there are many reasons as to why dysphoric outcomes of cyberbullying are different
and potentially more than traditional bullying. For example, the computer-based messages are
more permanent as compared to the verbal statements as they are preserved in websites,
internet archives, search engine caches, and user devices; it is easier to make hurtful,
embarrassing, or threatening statements on the Internet because of comparative difficulty in
detecting and identifying the misbehavior and offending party, proving or verifying the act of
wrongdoing, and imposing a meaningful sanction; victimization through the Internet is
omnipresent beyond the school, playground, or neighborhood due to the ubiquity of
computers and cell phones and the “always-connected” lives that adolescents in todays’
world lead; the youth is increasingly embracing new mediums and devices of
communication, and thus the number of potential victims and offenders is rapidly growing.[5]
The repercussions of virtual and seemingly not real harassment are very evidently seen in the
real world, in our schools, and even in our homes, the place where the child is supposed to
feel the most safe.
In the Indian context, year by year, due to increasing access to technology, inexpensive
internet plans, and politicians vehemently pursuing and pushing the dream of “Digital India,”
the risk of cyberbullying is alarming and its assessment and prevention become even more
urgent. Now, the overwhelming majority of population has access to the Internet through a
computer, a tablet, or mostly on a mobile device. The most vulnerable of this population are
our children and teenagers, who are being catapulted into cyberspace before they are actually
capable of making sense of it psychologically. The Global Youth Online Behaviour Survey
conducted by Microsoft ranked India third in cyberbullying, with 53% of the respondents,
mainly children admitting to have experienced online bullying, falling behind only China and
Singapore.[6]
Children and adolescents are naturally curious and, more often than not, more competent with
technology than adults. Most of these children exploring the Internet are not old enough to
detect or understand the risks online as well as the consequences of their own behavior
online. Despite minimum age requirements for joining popular social media platforms such
as Facebook and Twitter, many children join these platforms by misrepresenting their age
mainly because these do not have any stringent guidelines for the age limit of joining.
According to Intel Security Teens, Tweens and Technology Study conducted over a period of
5 years in India, the results published in 2015 claim that 81% of the children aged 8 to 16
years are already active on social media. Nearly 77% of these children had a Facebook
account before they were 13 years of age. Almost 22% of these children, that is, one in five
children, face online abuse.[7] These 2015 data are alarming and make us wonder what the
figures might be now. Children become vulnerable to the dark underbelly of the Internet
where an anonymous person sitting on a computer miles away can permanently scar their
self-esteem by the power of a click, making cyberspace a dangerous and largely unmonitored
playground. As a rule, Indian parents warn their children about strangers lurking on the street.
There is a dire need of doing the same for online behavior as well, yet it is hardly done or
even considered worrisome.
Recently, with the swiftly increasing number of stories pertaining to cyberbullying involving
matters as serious as self-harm and suicide, and harrowing headlines in newspapers reading
“Two preteens arrested for cyberbullying after student hangs herself” becoming a common
sight, cyberbullying has come at the center of international conversation. For example,
mainstream Australian politicians are putting forward ideas for an “anti-cyberbullying
taskforce” on national agenda, and real-time discussion is happening in the parliament on
policymaking and guidelines to put cyberbullying to an end.[8] On the other end of the
spectrum, various cyber-psychologists and researchers are studying the phenomenon and
relevant characteristics of cyberbullying extensively. One such example is Dr. Mary Aiken,
who in her book The Cyber Effect[9] describes the psychological phenomenon of “Diffusion
of Responsibility” in relation to cyberbullying. It is described that the greater the number of
people who witness a crime of emergency, the less likely any of them will feel responsible to
respond. It can also be called The Bystander Effect and, in case of cyberbullying, hundreds to
thousands of people can witness bullying or harsh criticism online on a regular basis but do
not step up and do anything. Two-thirds of teenagers who face online cruelty also witness
others joining in, and more than one-fifth of the teens report to have joined the harassment
themselves.[10]
Furthermore, just like most of the social media platforms use social analytics to make
algorithms to estimate user's age, sex, and political leanings, there are actual mathematical
algorithms to identify antisocial behavior, bullying, or harassment online. These algorithms
use simple parameters to measure the content (words such as “bitch,”; “hate,” and “die”),
direction, interval, and frequency of bullying. This kind of approach will help the law
enforcement agencies, schools, as well as parents to keep their eyes open on whether the
child is being bullied online.
Apart from children, adults also get bullied online on a regular basis. Cyberbullies,
commonly referred as trolls on the internet, basking in anonymity have the power of abusing
and harassing a person without fear of any ramification of their actions. Politicians, actors,
and sportspersons get cyberbullied routinely and report the distress it causes to them. Yet,
there are no clear laws or regulatory guidelines to handle this complex issue. Mainstream
national TV channels are recognizing the relevance of this issue in the current scenario and
are coming up with campaigns and programs such as “Troll Police.”[11]
In India, Section 66A of the amended IT Act deals with these crimes. Sending any message
(through a computer or a communication device) that is grossly offensive or has menacing
character – any communication which he/she knows to be false, but for the purpose of
causing insult, annoyance, and criminal intimidation, under the current Indian
IT/Cyber/Criminal laws – is punishable upto 3 years of imprisonment with a fine, but this law
fails to deal with the intricacies of cyberbullying. It is high time that the mental health
fraternity comes forward to address the issue of cyberbullying with more focused research
and help the lawmakers in formulating policies and regulatory laws that will help to identify
as well as curb the menace. Another important and effective broker in identifying and
stopping cyberbullying is school, where the role of mental health professional becomes
pivotal in formulating effective school-based anti-cyberbullying programs, which focus on
individual psychotherapy as well as educate the students on cyber-ethics and the cyber laws.
Cyberbullying is an online problem that needs to be dealt with offline, and like Theodore
Roosevelt popularly said “Knowing what's right doesn't mean much unless you do what's
right,” merely acknowledging cyberbullying as a problem is not enough anymore. It is also
imperative that mental health professionals use their critical expertise in formulating and
implementing school- and community-wide approaches to cyberbullying prevention.