If You Are Being Stalked On The Internet ...

These days, the invasion of privacy has taken on a frighteningly technological dimension. Stalkers, just like thousands of other people worldwide, have found their way onto the Internet, only to exploit the technology to their own end.

As the Internet grows – with tens of thousands of new users signing on each month – more and more of us become victims of electronic stalkers. In areas like San Diego, as many as 20% of the stalking cases involve cyber-stalking. In New York, the number could be as high as 40%.

Though cyber-stalking may sound somewhat benign since it doesn’t necessarily involve actual contact, the preponderance of information about your personal and professional life that’s available online makes it downright ominous. Even if you’re working hard to maintain your privacy, a single credit header can undo all your efforts. Credit headers, which top credit reports, include your name, residential address and unlisted phone number, social security number and employer, data that’s routinely culled from any bank or car loan applications, mortgages, or credit cards. And though the credit report itself is legally held to be confidential, the header is not. So the personal information you supplied in good faith gets sold by the country’s top three credit reporting agencies to online information brokers. They, in turn, sell it to anyone who wants it.

As with regular stalking, cyber-stalking often begins when you attempt to break off a relationship. The posting online of naked pictures taken when things were good during a relationship has become an increasingly popular method of revenge for the jilted. Online vendettas can also stem from downright impersonal contact. The beliefs you express online can make you a target if someone disagrees with you. Even the way you express them – especially if you’re new to the online rules of the road – can inadvertently offend or trigger someone. An obvious lack of cyber-smarts can make you a target, the same way a real-life stalker will target the easy mark.

To avoid being targeted, learn net-iquette, the rules and regulations of online behavior. With that under your belt, follow these tips:

• Opt for free email services where you don’t have to provide your name or address, since most Internet Service Providers make membership directories publicly available. If you’re having a problem, change your email address.
• Since women are especially vulnerable to online harassment, select a gender-less screen or ID name.
• Don’t use your real name or nickname.
• Choose a complicated password that combines letters and numbers, then change it often.
• Don’t respond to online provocation.
• Don’t flirt online.
• Immediately get out of any hostile online communication by logging off or finding another site.
• Guard your privacy jealously. Avoid giving out personal information in discussion groups or chat rooms, including your real name, where you live, and what you do for a living. Remember that these online conversations are archived, and can be accessed by anyone.
• On the commercial front, don’t fill out forms (including product registration forms) online, or participate in on- or offline contests, sweepstakes or surveys.
• If you’re a university student, refrain from providing biographical information for the free university email service. Better yet, sign up for your own private email account.

In the end, the responsibility to protect yourself electronically begins and ends with you. Unfortunately, however, even following every possible precaution may not be enough to protect you completely, due to the Internet’s almost total lack of regulation. So user, go carefully into that dark ‘Net'.

             The above article can be found at:
             http://www.stalkingvictims.com/whats/cyberstalking.htm

 

More Information: National Center for Victims of Crimes

Cyberstalking can be defined as threatening behavior or unwanted advances directed at another using the Internet and other forms of online and computer communications.

Cyberstalking is a relatively new phenomenon. With the decreasing expense and thereby increased availability of computers and online services, more individuals are purchasing computers and "logging onto" the Internet, making another form of communication vulnerable to abuse by stalkers.

Cyberstalkers target their victims through chat rooms, message boards, discussion forums, and e-mail. Cyberstalking takes many forms such as: threatening or obscene e-mail; spamming (in which a stalker sends a victim a multitude of junk e-mail); live chat harassment or flaming (online verbal abuse); leaving improper messages on message boards or in guest books; sending electronic viruses; sending unsolicited e-mail; tracing another person's computer and Internet activity, and electronic identity theft.

Similar to stalking off-line, online stalking can be a terrifying experience for victims, placing them at risk of psychological trauma, and possible physical harm. Many cyberstalking situations do evolve into off-line stalking, and a victim may experience abusive and excessive phone calls, vandalism, threatening or obscene mail, trespassing, and physical assault.

Cyberstalking and the Law

With personal information becoming readily available to an increasing number of people through the Internet and other advanced technology, state legislators are addressing the problem of stalkers who harass and threaten their victims over the World Wide Web. Stalking laws and other statutes criminalizing harassment behavior currently in effect in many states may already address this issue by making it a crime to communicate by any means with the intent to harass or alarm the victim.

States have begun to address the use of computer equipment for stalking purposes by including provisions prohibiting such activity in both harassment and anti-stalking legislation (Riveira, 1,2). A handful of states, such as Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, New Hampshire and New York have specifically including prohibitions against harassing electronic, computer or e-mail communications in their harassment legislation. Alaska, Oklahoma, Wyoming, and more recently, California, have incorporated electronically communicated statements as conduct constituting stalking in their anti-stalking laws. A few states have both stalking and harassment statutes that criminalize threatening and unwanted electronic communications. Other states have laws other than harassment or anti-stalking statutes that prohibit misuse of computer communications and e-mail, while others have passed laws containing broad language that can be interpreted to include cyberstalking behaviors (Gregorie).

Recent federal law has addressed cyberstalking as well. The Violence Against Women Act, passed in 2000, made cyberstalking a part of the federal interstate stalking statute. Other federal legislation that addresses cyberstalking has been introduced recently, but no such measures have yet been enacted. Consequently, there remains a lack of legislation at the federal level to specifically address cyberstalking, leaving the majority of legislative prohibitions against cyberstalking at the state level (Wiredpatrol.org).

If you are a Victim of Cyberstalking

• Victims who are under the age of 18 should tell their parents or another adult they trust about any harassments and/or threats.
• Experts suggest that in cases where the offender is known, victims should send the stalker a clear written warning. Specifically, victims should communicate that the contact is unwanted, and ask the perpetrator to cease sending communications of any kind. Victims should do this only once. Then, no matter the response, victims should under no circumstances ever communicate with the stalker again. Victims should save copies of this communication in both electronic and hard copy form.
• If the harassment continues, the victim may wish to file a complaint with the stalker's Internet service provider, as well as with their own service provider. Many Internet service providers offer tools that filter or block communications from specific individuals.
• As soon as individuals suspect they are victims of online harassment or cyberstalking, they should start collecting all evidence and document all contact made by the stalker. Save all e-mail, postings, or other communications in both electronic and hard-copy form. If possible, save all of the header information from e-mails and newsgroup postings. Record the dates and times of any contact with the stalker.
• Victims may also want to start a log of each communication explaining the situation in more detail. Victims may want to document how the harassment is affecting their lives and what steps they have taken to stop the harassment.
• Victims may want to file a report with local law enforcement or contact their local prosecutor's office to see what charges, if any, can be pursued. Victims should save copies of police reports and record all contact with law enforcement officials and the prosecutor's office.
• Victims who are being continually harassed may want to consider changing their e-mail address, Internet service provider, a home phone number, and should examine the possibility of using encryption software or privacy protection programs. Any local computer store can offer a variety of protective software, options and suggestions. Victims may also want to learn how to use the filtering capabilities of email programs to block e-mails from certain addresses.
• Furthermore, victims should contact online directory listings such as www.four11.com, www.switchboard.com, and www.whowhere.com to request removal from their directory.
• Finally, under no circumstances should victims agree to meet with the perpetrator face to face to "work it out," or "talk." No contact should ever be made with the stalker. Meeting a stalker in person can be very dangerous.

Potential Effects of Cyberstalking

Just because cyberstalking does not include physical contact with the perpetrator does not mean it is not as threatening or frightening as any other type of crime. Victims of cyberstalking often experience psychological trauma, as well as physical and emotional reactions as a result of their victimization. Some of these effects may include:

• changes in sleeping and eating patterns
• nightmares
• hypervigilance
• anxiety
• helplessness
• fear for safety
• shock and disbelief

Victims experiencing these reactions and many others might consider seeking out support from friends, family and victim service professionals in order to cope with the trauma resulting from cyberstalking. In order to locate local victim service professionals that may be able to offer assistance, safety suggestions, and information and referrals, please contact the Helpline of the National Center for Victims of Crime at 1-800-FYI-CALL, 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, Eastern Standard Time.

Resources on the World Wide Web:

• National Center for Victims of Crime Stalking Resource Center
• National Network to End Domestic Violence (NNEDV)
• Working to Halt Online Abuse (WHOA) - whoa@haltabuse.org
• Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
• Online Privacy Alliance

Your local prosecutor's office, law enforcement, or state Attorney General's office. Check in the Blue Pages of your local phone book under the appropriate section heading of either "Local Government," "County Government," or "State Government."

References

• U.S. Department of Justice. (August 1999). Cyberstalking: A New Challenge for Law Enforcement and Industry -- A Report from the Attorney General to the Vice President. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, pp. 2, 6.
• Gregorie, Trudy. Cyberstalking: Dangers on the Information Superhighway. The Stalking Resource Center, The National Center for Victims of Crime. Online.
• Riveira, Diane. (September/October 2000). "Internet Crimes Against Women," Sexual Assault Report, 4 (1).
• Wired Patrol. "US Federal Laws- Cyberstalking." Accessed 15 April 2003. http://www.wiredpatrol.org/stalking/federal.html
  

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Another Helpful Article You May Want To Read:

Cyberstalking and Internet Safety FAQ
by Rachel R. Hartman
http://www.sfwa.org/gateway/stalking.htm 

Tags: Internet Stalking, cyber-stalking, cyberstalking and the law, internet safety, National Center For Victims Of Violent Crimes, Getting Help, Resources