Online Harassment: Here What You Need To Know

 Online harassment - from a fake account to hateful slurs and death threats - is all began with the introduction of social media itself. However, this problem is growing at a slow pace. This abuse poses a great threat to the victim's private and social life. They keep feeling depressed, lost their well-paid jobs or even landlord force them to move out leaving them homeless at the end.

Online bullying can happen to any age group. However, it is common in adolescent and teen as they don't know how they are treated in online media. The major symptoms a child shows when they are bullying in social media are:

• Being upset and emotional while using Social Media
• Get nervous easily while receiving text and messages
• Unwilling to share information about online accounts
• Unexplained weight loss or weight gain, have headache or trouble in eating
• Suddenly became anti-social
• Making a passing statement about committing suicide

These are some of the symptoms that not only a child but adults also show. But bearing the pain in silence is not the option. Cyberbullying or harassment is a buzzword in the online platform. There are many laws that help you to report against them.

Types of Online Harassment and How You Should Handle Them

Before knowing the laws against online harassment, it is important to identify the abuse a person might face. There are many types of online harassment but we will discuss major types of them:

• Cyberbullying - It is an umbrella term that includes a number of harassing behaviours. It generally aims to threat, humiliate or embarrass a person in online media. 

How to handle: Visit Cyberbullying.org for the best resources and information related to cyberbullying.

• Cyber Stalking - It is a prolong use to online harassment that is intended to kill, injure or harass a victim. It comprises a number of harassing behaviour committed on a daily basis so that the victim will suffer from anxiety, depression, humiliation and fear.

How to handle: Block cyber-stalker from all online platform and collect evidence of what you have done to stop them  

• Doxing - In the 90s, computer hackers usually do dox to reveal sensitive data of a company in order to take revenge. The idea is the same in today's scenario but goes on an online platform. Today, doxing involves publishing someones personal information online so that the victim will be harassed.

How to handle: Make your social account private and get a VPN to protect your location

• Hacking - It is often referred to as unauthorised access to other's device in order to harass or steal their data or violate the privacy of the owner's device. When hacking to use to threaten the target then it comes under cybercrime. 

How to handle: Practising rigorous cybersecurity is the first step you can take toward preventing hacking. Use password hygiene to make your data secure

• Online Impersonation - It's a strategy to where a harasser creates a fake account in victim's name in order to post inflammatory statements. Their intention is to defame the target by convincing others to believe the fake quotes attributed to the victim. It is most common in social media platforms,

How to handle: Maintain adequate identity theft protection on your device and contact a lawyer to build a case for you

• Trolling - Trolling is a vast concept in terms of online harassment. It is generally referred to as the repetitive posting of hateful comments online by harasser whose intent is to seek attention or harm or cause controversy to the target.

How to handle: Don' respond or provoke and block the person who harasses you in social media. Report them on the social platform is the best choice

These are some of the major types of online harassment, people now or then faces. Now, you have learnt various types of online harassments and identify yourself what online harassment you are facing, then it's time to take action against it.

What You Can Do To Avoid Online Harassment

• Avoid participating in forums or sites that encourage anonymous posts

It is good to avoid using sites that have a history of user complaints about allowing in-appropriate content to remain in website or not taking sufficient action,

• Use Google Alerts

Google alerts will facilitate email notification being sent to you whenever you or your family member's name appear online

• Report abuse in social media

Blocking, muting and reporting online harassment in social media platform is a different option you can choose to. 

1. Blocking: Harasser cannot communicate or follow you
2. Muting: You no longer see them in your notifications
3. Reporting: You can report so that social media will take action against them.

It is a valuable tool to eradicate harasser in your life and you can lead a peaceful life.

• Practice Password Hygiene

In order to protect yourself from online harassment, you should follow password hygine religiously These may include:

1. Using 16 digit long password having numbers, alphabets and special symbols
2. Set up two-factor authentication
3. Establish firm boundaries between personal and professional presence online

These are some of the points where you can avoid online harassments. There are many. Remember, the online platform has many types of people with different mindsets, hence thought conflicts may arise and they can say abusive language. But when these things that will hamper your peace of mind, then you should take legal action against it. You should document their behaviours and reveal them in court. 

Don't bear the pain in silence because if you do, it will only help the harasser to increase their activities to step further at rapid speed. Only you have the power to push back against abuse and protect the space for free expression in the digital realm.