Authorities say a DeSoto Parish, Lousiana Baptist preacher has been arrested on three counts of cyber stalking after members of his former congregation accused him of sending threatening e-mails and text messages.

Deputies say 55-year-old Jim Reynolds of Mansfield was freed from the parish jail after posting a bond totaling $3,156. Cpl. Dusty Herring told The Times that Reynolds, former pastor of Graceway Baptist Church in the Carmel community northeast of Mansfield, was arrested on warrants secured through a justice of the peace.

Herring said Reynolds had been involved in an ongoing controversy after he was released from his pastoring duties about two months ago. It was not immediately known whether Reynolds has an attorney.

Labels: controversy, cyberstalker, cyberstalking, emails, parishoners, pastor, threats

The lucky ones need only change their e-mail address or return goods they did not order. At worst, however, cyberstalking victims end up with a ruined reputation or a plundered bank account.

Cyberstalking takes many forms. And the abuse of personal data on the internet to play tricks on people or exert pressure on them is growing, experts say. Cultivation of one's web image and more careful use of personal data can help prevent trouble, however.

A general term used by lawyers and law enforcement authorities for internet offences, cyberstalking is "an artificial concept" that still lacks a precise definition, explained Berlin lawyer Ulrich Schulte am Huelse. Basically, it covers the various ways people are harassed and stalked via the internet.

The risk of victimization rises with the frequency of internet use, experts say.

German police have no statistics on cyberstalking. "It's probably on the increase. We don't keep a record of offences under this heading," said Frank Scheulen, spokesman for North Rhine-Westphalia's State Office of Criminal Investigation, in Dusseldorf.

"As the new media grow and spread, it stands to reason that cyberstalking is growing as well," remarked Professor Harald Dressing, a member of the Mannheim-based Central Institute of Mental Health.

The consequences include personal affronts along with practical problems. "Using other people's names, cyberstalkers buy and sell goods in online and mail-order transactions. They publish harassing homepages and blogs, and commit punishable offenses," Scheulen noted.

He said that sending unwanted e-mails was also common, as was the unauthorized publication or manipulation of photographs or purported statements with suggestive content by the victim.

Most cases of cyberstalking are due to the careless use of personal data on the internet. Victims should notify the police as soon as it occurs, Scheulen said.

"Then the police can trace the perpetrator through the internet service provider and IP address," he added.

If the police have been notified, a warning, cease-and-desist order and damages claim have a good chance of success, noted Schulte am Huelse, who recommended that victims document cyberstalking from the beginning in preparation for legal action.

Careful use of the internet and personal data helps prevent cyberstalking. "Don't reveal personal information such as hobbies or preferences," Scheulen advised. Most importantly, telephone numbers, addresses and names should not be published in chat rooms, he said, because "you don't know who's lurking in the web and to what use the data will be put."

Dressing said that users of social and business networking websites should only allow friends and acquaintances to access their personal profile. After all, he pointed out, no one runs around the centre of town wearing a sign showing their personal data.

ORIGINAL

Labels: anxiety, cyberharassment, cyberstalker, cyberstalking, defamation, fear, personal data, slander

People Search Engines: They Know Your Dark Secrets … and Tell Anyone
By JR Raphael, PC World

Social search engines can turn up your Amazon Wish List, photos of your kids, where your kids go to school, your address, your business, where you went to school, your musical tastes, your medical problems, all about your breakups & divorces, your mental health status and much, much more. What else is out there that you don't want everyone to know, and what can you do to protect yourself?


I know things about my lawyer I absolutely should not know. He's 55 years old, listens to the music of the band Creed, and screams like a little girl when riding roller coasters. He also relaxes with New Age spa treatments and is thinking about getting an electronic nose-hair trimmer. And that's just the start.

Now, let me be clear: I've never spent a single moment outside the office with this guy (and for what it's worth, I'd just as soon not be privy to his personal grooming habits). I learned all of these details by tracking his social footprint across the Web -- and he probably has no idea that he has left such a vivid trail behind.

In our age of social sharing, we expect some of our thoughts to be public. But as we slowly put more and more pieces of ourselves online, specialized search engines are making it easier than ever to pull them together into a highly detailed (and potentially invasive) profile of our virtual lives (read "Online Stalking Made Easy").

I'll let you in on a little secret: The picture isn't always pretty. And even if no rap sheet turns up, do you really want the world to know that you look at bad-breath cures online or post awful "Star Trek" fan fiction?

The depths of the Deep Web
You hear a lot of terms bounced around when you talk about this growing breed of search engines. Some services like to be called "social search" utilities, while others prefer the phrase "people search." Many boast of their ability to delve through the "Deep Web" that even Google doesn't touch.

"Even though most people think the size of the Web is basically the Google crawl index, there's actually a lot of information that Google doesn't crawl," says Harrison Tang, founder and CEO of Spokeo -- which, taking a mash-up approach to its identification, describes itself as a "social people search engine" service.

People search engine Spokeo is upfront about what it thinks it can find on anyone.
Spokeo, like its competitors Pipl and CVGadget, is designed to let you dig up information on friends, foes and anyone in between. Spokeo goes a step further than many of the other services, though, by importing your entire e-mail address book.

Then, for a few bucks a month, it continually monitors your contacts and lets you know whenever anyone has done anything new, anywhere online. (The site's home page promises to help you "uncover personal photos, videos and secrets," including "juicy" and "mouth-watering news about friends and co-workers.")

Each individual bit of information may seem insignificant, but the cumulative effect of seeing it assembled in a neatly packaged portfolio is enough to give almost anyone pause.

"Aggregated identity is actually a new type of identity," Tang says, theorizing about why so many people seem to use the word "spooky" when describing his service. "A lot of people know that they have a public MySpace page, a lot of people know that they have a public Twitter album. But, when combined together, it's not one plus one equals two -- you actually create a new identity."

How Spokeo works
Spokeo's system uses your contacts' e-mail addresses to track their activity on a few dozen services, ranging from basic blogs and social networks to a slew of photo- and video-sharing sites. That means the random photos of your kids you shared on Flickr two years ago (or perhaps those less innocent images from your spring-break trip a decade earlier) will pop up right under your name, seconds after someone searches for you.
Less obvious sources such as Amazon Wish Lists, Pandora playlists and movie rating sites fill in the colorful details that you may not have realized were out there at all -- things like (in my lawyer's case) an affinity for New Age jams and nasal maintenance.

I found Mr. Attorney's age on an old MySpace profile and his roller coaster behavior on a personal YouTube video, but Pandora divulged his cravings for Creed and his suggested usages for the "Spa Radio" station he had created. As for the nose-hair trimmer, he can thank his Amazon Wish List for sending that factoid my way.

For sale: Your information
Rapleaf gathers information from the Deep Web -- often posted by you -- and sells it to marketers.

Other services access the same data and then sell the information under the banner of marketing research. One highly visible example is Rapleaf, a company that describes its services as "data and people lookup." Clients pay thousands of dollars to have detailed social profiles of individuals compiled in their own customer databases. As is the case with the data that Spokeo assembles, the information is all publicly available -- Rapleaf just brings it together. "Things that people have posted are out there for anyone to come and see," says Joel Jewitt, Rapleaf's vice president of business development. "As long as you're not going beyond that, that's within the privacy norms today."

Most of Rapleaf's clients, Jewitt says, are simply trying to understand how to use social media more effectively for marketing. An auto manufacturer, for example, might want to know which car models its customers are checking out and discussing on social Internet services. Armed with the company's list of customer e-mail addresses, Rapleaf would crawl the Web and track down the information, person by person.

"It's pretty standard Web spidering," Jewitt says. "We re-create in an automatic way what someone from the general public would be able to do if they were looking."

Electronic exposure
Whether they target businesses or individuals, the services have one thing in common: Unlike the public-record-driven search tools of the past, the new people-tracking utilities build a highly detailed dossier about you solely from information that you yourself published -- a circumstance that may give you a distinct feeling of discomfort.

"What it does is make the ubiquity of the Internet and the sheer openness of the world tangible," says Internet privacy expert Kevin B. McDonald, executive vice president of Alvaka Networks, a network management firm. "It makes the whole concept of the world sharing of information and the 'no-walls' approach that the Internet was designed for very real to people."

The reality can be chilling if the information is going to certain interested individuals: a curious client, a boss big on background checks or an obsessive ex, say. A recent study reported that half of all British Internet users surveyed admitted to having used the Internet to look up information on a former flame. The ease with which someone can arrange to monitor your every electronic move certainly adds a new dimension to the idea of fixation.

"It is a little 'stalkery,'" says Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "If the information is distributed, that's actually a form of privacy. When it's gathered up in one place, it creates some new risks."

Rotenberg is no fan of companies that assemble nuggets of personal but public information to turn a profit. "The fact that someone's made something public doesn't mean that someone else can sell it," he contends. "I would say even with affirmative consent, if there's going to be a market for personal data, the user should get some percentage of whatever value the data has."

Taking control
The thing to remember, of course, is that these services aren't doing anything illegal. The information they gather is information that anyone who knew where to look -- and had the time to do it -- could find. So rather than ignoring the king-size file that may have been collected on you, McDonald suggests, you should try to use it as a tool to understand and control your online identity.

"I've come to the point where rather than be driven by the Internet, I intend to drive it to the degree that I can," he says.

"All you can do is learn to live with it," McDonald says. "That's the confines of the world that we live in."

For suggestions on concrete steps you can take to reduce your online exposure, see "People Search Engines: Slam the Door on What Info They Can Collect."

ORIGINAL

Labels: cyberharassment, cyberstalking, data mining, information, privacy, public information, social networking, websites

A television presenter has told how she feared for her life after a viewer bombarded her with abusive emails while she was pregnant.

Alexis Bowater, 39, received a stream of threatening messages including one which read: 'I hope your baby dies'.

The former newsreader said the threats kept her awake at night and made her frightened to be at home alone without her husband.

Alexander Reeve, 24, sent her 26 messages in one five month period, leading Mrs Bowater to constantly fear for her and her children's safety.

Alexis Bowater was harassed by Alexander Reeve throughout her pregnancy.

Speaking after her tormentor admitted sending numerous emails of a violent or sexual nature, Mrs Bowater said: 'I would lie in bed at night thinking, 'Is this person going to kill me? Am I going to die?'

'I would be in an empty house with no husband around, and when you're comforting a toddler in the middle of the night and you hear a creak on the stairs, it's absolutely terrifying.

'I used to go to bed making plans of how I was going to get myself and my children out of the house if someone came in.

'It was terrifying. You wonder about the people driving in a car behind you and people in the street. Nobody knew who he was or what he looked like.'

Mrs Bowater, who presented the evening news on ITV Westcountry, said police became involved when the harassment started in 2006 but their investigations drew a blank.

The daughter of Sir Euan and Lady Bowater of Chagford said:

'Then it started again and they pieced it together.

'I've had people harassing me on and off over the years since I've been working at ITV but never, ever this aggressive and serious.'

She added: 'He was sending anonymous e-mails to work which were pretty aggressive, graphic and threatening. This went on for years.

'This last summer was the worst, the threats and e-mails were escalating. They only just stopped short of threatening to take my life.

'He was threatening very serious damage to me and he claimed to know where I lived.'

Last week Reeve, from Looe, Cornwall, pleaded guilty to five counts of communicating false information with intent and causing fear of violence.

He also admitted twice communicating false information that a bomb was in the ITV studios at Langage Science Park in Plymouth, Devon, and will be sentenced next month.

Plymouth Crown Court heard he sent emails 'of an extremely explicit sexual nature' with some specifically referring to Ms Bowater's pregnancy.

The court heard he was 'fragile' and lived with his parents and his threats were considered 'very real'.

Mrs Bowater, who is now a full time mother and lives in South Devon, said after the hearing: 'I am so pleased that this cowardly man who terrorised me, my family and my unborn children for so many years has been brought to justice.

'He was saying all sorts of unspeakable things that an unspeakable person would do to a woman.

'People ought to realise you can't do this to people. Maybe people go on the internet and think if they send emails or say things it doesn't affect people, but it does.

A police spokesman said: 'This should send out a stark message to those who think, for whatever reason, that they will not be caught if they choose to undertake this kind of reckless activity.'

~~~~~~~~~~


Suspect Faces Cyberstalking Federal Charges For Indiana Incident
An Ohio man who used phony MySpace (dot) com pages to embarrass a Lake Station couple faces federal cyberstalking charges.

Thomas Slapnicker, 26, was arrested near Cleveland, Ohio for allegedly making threats against a victim in Lake Station and her partner, and using the social networking website MySpace to create Web pages posing as the couple, according to a federal indictment released this week.

The indictment says that after the woman obtained a court order prohibiting Slapnicker from contacting her, he then used MySpace and other sites to embarrass her and make her boyfriend appear to be a racist pedophile.

On one phony page, Slapnicker posted the victims' address and offered to meet strangers there for sex.

On a second page, he portrayed the second victim as a pedophile and a racist, again posting their address and inviting "those who disagreed with these claims to meet (the victim)" at their residence, the indictment states.

Slapnicker also allegedly made a series of threatening phone calls to the victims from Ohio, a violation of a restraining order.

Slapnicker's attorney, Roseann Ivanovich, could not be reached.

Authorities say he has been jailed since being arrested and will be transferred to Indiana for federal court hearings in Hammond.

ORIGINAL

Labels: cyberharassment, cyberpaths, cyberstalking, harassment, illegal, online predators, pathological, prison, sociopaths, threats

Facebook is not only a site where you can connect with friends and family while taking in a game of FrontierVille, it’s also a complex network that spans the entire world. So what happens when someone stalks you on Facebook, while sending you disturbing messages? In the past the outcome was typically a slap on the wrist, possibly a misdemeanour charge, but that could soon change. The new outcome? Federal Interstate stalking charges if the person that’s stalking you lives in another state.

Law & Order: Criminal Intent star Kathryn Erbe is currently involved in a 2 year stalking case in which deranged fan Charles Nagel not only visited her shooting location in New York, but also harassed her daughter and brother through the popular Facebook service and MySpace. Prosecutors are now determined to have Nagel charged with interstate stalking, a charge that brings with it up to 5-years in prison and a felony count on the guilty person’s record.

While Nagel’s travel to New York city is at the center of the controversy, a guilty verdict with Federal charges attached could give enough precedence for further interstate charges to be filed against Facebook followers who have chosen to stalk their prey online across state lines. The question will become, where is the line drawn between stalking someone from another state in person versus over the internet. Enough news of suicides by harassment and fights caused by text messages have arisen lately that the social impact during the outcome of this case could stem beyond simple misdemeanors charges.

While the case is far from determined, it will be interesting to see how social media plays it’s part in the trial, a guilty verdict in a case dominated by social media mentions could help form social network policing policies for years to come.

What do you think, should Facebook, MySpace and other social networking harassment be tolerated more than traditional stalking or should these crazy online stalkers face harsher penalties as they use modern means to attack their obsessions?

http://www.inquisitr.com/76773/stalking-an-old-flame-on-facebook-how-about-some-federal-charges/

Labels: charges, cyberstalking, facebook, federal law, harassment, obsessive, prison, social networking, stalking

by Shelby Hill

Many college students use Facebook.com daily without being aware of the cyberstalking threat.

When students put their phone numbers, addresses and other personal information on a social networking site like Facebook, they increase their chances of being a cyberstalking victim, said Michael Kaiser, executive director of the National Cyber Security Alliance.

January was National Stalking Awareness Month and Kaiser said that because people between the ages of 18-24 have the highest victimization rate, due to the popularity of Facebook and MySpace.com, it's important for students to protect themselves against cyberstalking.

"People should be really guarded in sharing personal information," Kaiser said. "I wouldn't suggest that the Internet is a place to write an autobiography."

According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project's January 2009 report about adults and social networking websites, 75 percent of Internet users in the 18-24 age group have a profile on a social networking Web site.

A social networking Web site is a place for people to connect with each other by creating a profile that each individual can customize with pictures, contact information and details about interests, such as music and movies, to reflect that person's personality. Kaiser said an e-mail address is usually the only information needed to become part of a social networking Web site.

Some tips Kaiser had for students were install a firewall, anti-spyware, use the highest privacy settings on social networking web sites and limit the information they put online.

Kaiser advised students that they should "be really careful about who you let into your circle."

Along with the active steps that students can take to protect themselves, Kaiser suggested that students enter their names into a search engine to see if they come across information that they didn't know was there.

"People don't even know sometimes how much information about them there is on the Web," Kaiser said. "People leave trails all over the Internet and stalkers will use those trails."

He said stalkers would use anything from an e-mail address to a phone number, street address or instant message, to stalk a victim.

Nick Penta, a pre-veterinary science freshman, said he thinks an ex-girlfriend stalked him over MySpace. He said she sent him several messages and viewed his profile about 20 times a day to learn about his new girlfriend.

Kaiser said stalking is defined as repeated actions that would cause a reasonable person to feel fear.

Penta added that he wasn't scared of his ex's actions.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice's January 2009 report "Stalking Victimization in the United States," of the 3.4 million Americans who reported being stalked, 25 percent reported being cyberstalked through email or instant messaging.

Stephen Orlando, a pre-business freshman said he experienced the same jealous behavior by an ex, over the Internet.

According to the report, 75 percent of stalking victims were stalked by someone they knew.

"The vast majority of stalking is done by people who know each other," Kaiser said.

Even taking into account Orlando and Penta's experiences with exes over the Web, the two men have not chosen to make their Facebook profiles private and non-viewable to users whom they have not given permission.

Kaiser advised students to "use the highest privacy settings you can on any of the social networking sites."

Amy Cheng, a pre-physiology freshman, said her Facebook profile is private and she doesn't post her personal information on the page.

"I don't put anything on there that I wouldn't show my mom," Cheng said about information on her Facebook profile.

Emily Smith, an undeclared freshman, said that although her profile isn't private, she doesn't put any contact information on her Facebook profile.
Facebook Stalking Pictures, Images and Photos

She added that if she had more of an issue with cyberstalking she might consider changing her profile to private.

Orlando said that he thinks that cyberstalking is more of an issue for women than men.

"There's a lot more creeper stalker people looking for girls than guys," he said.

Penta said that the difference could be attributed to the fact that some women put relatively provocative photos on their individual profiles.

"They're easier targets, just because their pictures might be more revealing," Penta said.

Whatever the reason, the Department of Justice report did concede that women run a much greater risk for being victims of cyberstalking than men.

Whether the victim is a man or woman, the fact that friends and family support the stalking victim is crucial, Kaiser said.

For more information on cyberstalking, Kaiser said that students should visit the National Center for Victims of Crime's Web site, www.ncvc.org or the National Cyber Security Alliance's Web site, www.staysafeonline.org.

Labels: cyberstalking, data, facebook, information, myspace, stalking, validation

By Arthur Martin

An ‘obsessive’ TV producer who stalked a former classmate for more than seven years was jailed for just 16 weeks on Monday.

Elliot Fogel, 34, subjected Claire Waxman to an ‘unimaginable’ ordeal by following her, breaking into her car and making hundreds of late-night phone calls to her home.

A search of his computer revealed he had Googled his victim more than 40,000 times in one year. But despite a judge ruling that Fogel’s actions had caused ‘mental harm’ to his victim, a police source revealed that he could be free in as little as six weeks.

Mrs. Waxman, 34, a complementary therapist from North-West London, attacked the sentence as too short and called for tougher jail terms in stalking cases.

‘I will get a couple of months’ respite at best, but I am under no illusion that he will be out of jail soon and the harassment will start again,’ she said. ‘What we are looking at here is an obsessive person who is highly likely to reoffend.

'There is currently not an appropriate sentence for stalking. This obsession started 20 years ago and it’s not going to suddenly stop after a few weeks in jail.’
by Arthur Martin

Wood Green Crown Court in North London heard how Fogel – a freelance producer at Sky Sports News and Capital Radio – first developed an unhealthy interest in Mrs Waxman while they were students at a college in St Albans, Hertfordshire.

She repeatedly told Fogel to leave her alone and, after leaving college in 1993, heard nothing more from him. However, ten years later, she received a dinner invitation from him, which she declined.

A few months later, in December 2003, Fogel, from Isleworth, West London, was spotted jogging on the spot outside her home and also began to spend increasing amounts of time hanging around her workplace.

Mrs Waxman told the court she felt ‘like a sitting duck’ as Fogel continued to follow her and make phone calls to her home.

After his arrest, a police search of his computer revealed he had also managed to get hold of Mrs Waxman’s wedding photographs and had a Google Earth aerial map of her home.

Further investigation found that he had paid for background searches to be carried out on Mrs Waxman’s husband Marc and her father, and that he had posed as a prospective parent at the nursery her daughter attended.

Jailing Fogel for 16 weeks after he admitted breaching a restraining order, Judge Fraser Morrison said:

‘Mrs Waxman wants some peace from you because you weren’t able to take the hint that any relationship you wanted with her was not going to take place.

‘You’re not an unintelligent man but you didn’t take the hint. She wants you out of her life.’

In a 16-page written impact statement to the court, Mrs Waxman described how she had suffered a miscarriage, developed an eating disorder, and had to move home five times as a result of her seven-year ordeal.

‘He has nothing in his life and all he chooses to do is pursue me and my family,’ she wrote. ‘Though there has been no physical harm, the mental harm of all these years is getting too heavy to bear.

‘My life has been ruined by this man in so many ways and yet no one can help us nor protect us.

'Instead of preventing something terrible from happening, I feel like we’re being left like sitting ducks waiting for something to happen.

‘He has said time and time again that he will leave me alone and yet never does. He still feels he is allowed to do what he wants because he has no moral compass.

‘He has no respect for me, my family, the law and I feel not even himself. Fogel is mentally unwell and has an obsession with me – he needs medical attention.’

Police have been unable to take tough action against Fogel because he has not made any physical threats to his victim. It means that officers have been able to use only anti-harassment laws to curb his campaign.

http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/news/article-1244219/TV-producer-stalked-classmate-Googled-40-000-times-jailed.html#ixzz0dDDdoXEp

Labels: cyberstalking, fogel, google, harassment, obsessive, stalker, waxman

Woman's Ex-Boyfriend Stalked Her for Years Using Software on Her Cell Phone

By LISA FLETCHER and COLE KAZDIN

Technology makes it easier to connect with the people in your life, but it can also enable others to connect to you without your knowledge.

People can learn all about your private life through your cell phone, and one woman said she was stalked for three years because of it. Susan, who asked that her real name be kept private because of worry over her safety, said her ex-boyfriend tormented her using only her cell phone to do it.

"He knew where I was all the time," Susan said. "If I was at dinner somewhere. He would text me and ask me how dinner was. I had no idea how he knew where I was."

Most people know that the GPS in a cell phone can track your every move, but that's just the beginning. Widely available software that can be installed on almost any cell phone can track not just your whereabouts but also your private conversations and personal information.

"I thought I was going crazy," Susan said. "It's just unnerving knowing that somebody 24/7 knows where you're at, what you're talking about, what's going on, everything about you."

At the time, Susan didn't know that her ex-boyfriend installed spying software on her phone when she wasn't looking. Once installed, he could be anywhere -- even in a different state -- and follow her every move.

But what was worse, it didn't just track her whereabouts. He could listen in on her phone calls, read her text messages and turn her personal cell phone into a bugging device. From anywhere, he could activate her speaker phone and listen to everything she was doing.

"He would text me, 'How was dinner? Was the date good?'" she recalled.

Susan's ex-boyfriend would also show up places where she was. She feared for her life and called the police, who put her in protective custody. When her ex-boyfriend violated the restraining order, he was put in jail on felony stalking charges.

"He had every intention of killing me," she said. "Within 20 minutes of getting out of jail, he was outside my hotel room."

Security expert Robert Siciliano says he gets countless e-mails from victims of cell phone spying.

"When somebody remotely activates your phone, you're not going to know it and they can use that phone to monitor the conversations in the room you're in," he said. "Your phone could be sitting next to you while you are watching TV, and somebody can actually log into your phone and can actually watch what you are watching on television."

Cell Phone Spying Software Affordable, Powerful
A 2009 report from the Department of Justice found that one-quarter of the 3.4 million stalking victims in the U.S. reported cyberstalking, and GPS technology and other forms of electronic monitoring were used to stalk one in 13 victims.

"GMA" found thousands of sites promoting cell phone spying software, boasting products to "catch cheating spouses," "bug meeting rooms" or "track your kids." Basic cell phone spying software costs as little as $50, but for a higher price the software enables anyone to do exactly what Susan's ex-boyfriend did.

"Someone can easily install a spyware program on your phone that allows them to see every single thing you do all day long, via the phone's video camera," Siciliano said.

"GMA" spent $350 to get the features that remotely activate speaker phones, intercept live calls and instantly notify you every time a call is made.

We installed the software on a colleague's phone, with her permission, and sent her out to see how it worked. We were able to intercept and listen in to a live phone call without her knowledge, and she didn't even have to be on the phone for us to spy on her. We could also turn her phone into a remote listening device no matter where she was. If the phone was on, we heard everything she said.

"This is no sci-fi flick," Siciliano said. "This is the real thing and it's happening to people right now."

It's perfectly legal to sell the software but not necessarily legal to use it, although that's in the fine print.

For people like Susan, the laws, which vary from state to state, haven't caught up to the technology. Police say there aren't specific laws on the books to address this type of stalking, as opposed to the physical stalking that led to the restraining order.

When it comes to cell phone spying, "The cops kept telling me there's nothing we can do," Susan said. "He's not breaking the law."

Protect Yourself from Cell Phone Spying
Susan changed her number 10 times, but it didn't help because the spyware was on the phone itself.

"I'd go and change my number at the cell phone store, and he would be calling me on my way home on my new cell phone number."

After three terrifying years, Susan realized the software was on her phone. She got a new one and it seems the nightmare has ended.

"You're never the same after this," she said. "I think you become a lot more aware of your surroundings, you're not as trusting. You just make it day to day and keep living."

Safety experts say that if you believe you've been the target of cyberstalking, trust your instincts and ask for help.

Indications that spyware might be on your cell phone:

The screen lights up for no reason
The flash on the camera goes off when you're not taking a picture
You notice ambient noise in the background when you're on a phone call
You repeatedly get strange text messages from an unknown origin


Tips:
Never let your cell phone out of your control -- spyware can be installed on it in as little as a few minutes.

If you think spyware is on your phone, security expert Robert Siciliano says you have two options: Get a a new phone or call your cell phone service provider. They will tell you how to reinstall the operating system. Reinstalling the operating system should wipe out the spyware.

Labels: cellphone, cyberstalking, software, spyware, stalking

James Ecret was arrested Saturday night. He was on the ferry to Tahlequah (Vashon Island - Washington State) from Pt. Defiance docked.

Detectives Say He's Stalking His Ex On The Web, And That's Just The Start.

King County detectives stressed urgency in finding this week's top fugitive, James Ecret.

He's a convicted felon accused of sticking a knife into his ex-girlfriend's door with a terrifying note that read, "I decide how the saga ends."

Ecret's ex says he's been harassing her for the past several weeks, and has also threatened officers that he won't go down without a fight.

Detectives say he's been convicted in the past of violating a no contact order, which is a felony, and his new threats have cops extremely concerned.

Sgt. John Urquhart with the King County Sheriff's Office paints a picture of just how serious the situation is.

"When you're sitting at a computer, typing away, threatening someone, or stalking them.. that's one thing," he said. "But, when you show up at somebody's house, leave a threatening note tacked to the door with a knife - that really gives us pause - somebody we want to find, and it certainly scares the heck out of this poor woman, who just wants to get away from this guy, and move on with her life."

Ecret has a $100,000 warrant for his arrest for cyberstalking, harassment, and vandalism.

Here are the details on James Ecret:

* Age: 49
* Ht: 5'10"
* Wt: 185 lbs
* Hair: Brown
* Eyes: Brown

Ecret has been convicted of harassment and cyberstalking before.

He has several protection orders against him by a number of different women.

Labels: cyberstalking, harassment, james ecret, protective order, restraining order

Cross posted with permission from EOPC

by Todd Leopold

There's a whole world of people out there, and boy, are they pissed off.

On political blogs, the invective flies. Posters respond to the latest celebrity gossip with mockery or worse. Sports fans set up Web sites with names that begin with "fire," hoping coaches, athletic directors and sportscasters lose their jobs.

And though there are any number of bloggers and commenters who attempt to keep their postings and responses on a civil level, all too often interactive Web sites descend into ad hominem attacks, insults and plain old name-calling. Indeed, there are even whole sites devoted to venting, such as justrage.com (one screed there was titled, "I don't give a flying f***, so f*** you") and mybiggestcomplaint.com.

This is not a world Emily Post would want to be caught in after dark.

"The Internet can be a great tool," said Sara Black, a professor of health studies at St. Joseph's University who takes a particular interest in online bullying. "Like any tool, it can also be misused."

One reason for the vitriol that emerges on the Web, experts say, is the anonymity the Internet provides. Commenters seldom use their real names, and even if they do, the chance for retaliation is slim.

"In the [pre-Internet era], you had to take ownership [of your remarks]. Now there's a perception of anonymity," said Lesley Withers, a professor of communication at Central Michigan University. "People think what they say won't have repercussions, and they don't think they have to soften their comments."

Contrast that with a face-to-face conversation, or even a phone conversation, where you can judge people's moods from facial movements or vocal inflections, observes University of Texas psychology professor Art Markman. iReport.com: Second Life avatars grapple with reduced nonverbal communication

"It's hard to be aggressive when you're face to face," he said.

Moreover, he points out, aggression often carries a subtext of power.

"A lot of times, real anger is an attempt to get control over a situation where the person doesn't usually have it," he said. In that respect, comments to blog posts are attempts to strike back.

Those power games are innately grasped by children and teens, with schools serving as a perennial social laboratory.

Cheryl Dellasega, a Penn State women's studies professor, ticks off hypothetical examples that could have come straight from the scripts to "Mean Girls" or "Heathers."

"Girls who are getting teased come home and let their [aggressors] have it by putting something on their blog and starting a rumor campaign," she said. And instead of rumors simply making the rounds among peer groups -- which can be bad enough -- "they go out to a much bigger group, a worldwide group. The impact is devastating, and it's as easy as clicking a button."

"Kids don't realize that one post can destroy somebody's life forever," she added.

Indeed, such incidents have made headlines. In 2006, 13-year-old Megan Meier committed suicide after becoming attracted to a boy on MySpace who then turned on her. The boy turned out to be a hoax created by a neighbor family that included a former friend of Meier's.

In August, The New York Times Magazine did a story about trolls, some barely out of their teens, who antagonize others for the sake of "lulz": "Lulz is watching someone lose their mind at their computer 2,000 miles away while you chat with friends and laugh," one ex-troll told the publication.

Adults aren't immune by any means. A Japanese woman, angry at her online "husband," killed his avatar after he divorced her. A South Korean actress committed suicide after being harassed by online rumors following a divorce. Celebrity gossip sites are full of snarky comments about stars; reaction from readers is often brutal, turning the story into the online equivalent of a pile-on.

Markman is quick to observe that he doesn't believe there's more anger out there. But, he said, "there are more ways of expressing it on the Internet."

"We've all had interactions with unpleasant people, but we don't confront them. We take it out elsewhere," he said. "What the Internet has created is groups of people where there are no repercussions with being too aggressive."

Indeed, though electronically transmitted anger has parallels throughout human history -- the bitter letter, the village gossip -- the speed at which it travels, and the number of people who may come in contact with it, is something new, says St. Joseph's Black.

"[Electronic] media can increase potential for violence in a number of ways," she said in an e-mail interview. "First, it introduces ideas (good and bad) that people may not have come up with on their own. Second, it is easier to depersonalize the victim, facilitating perpetration. Third, aggressive behaviors may be reinforced with points, attention or status, especially in games."

Withers has seen that first hand. She teaches a course on the "dark side of communication" at Central Michigan, involving "the mean or evil things we do on a day-to-day basis," as she describes it: cheating, for example, or lying.

As part of the course, several of her students work on a collaborative project with students at other schools, and they come together in Second Life, the virtual reality environment. If someone isn't pulling his or her weight, says Withers, others can be harsh in their judgments -- harsher than in real life, because the anger is expressed at the person's avatar. Sidebar: Dealing with anger in Second Life

Which led at least one of Withers' students to forget that the avatar was attached to a real person.

"One student went off on another student and she was sitting in the classroom a few rows behind him," she said. "He knew she was there, but didn't -- there was that distancing."

Is there a way to restore civility to the Internet? Among children and teenagers, say Dellasega and Black, it's up to parents to exercise control.

"I think parents need to take responsibility," Dellasega said. "They give kids computers and leave them alone. ... When a child is 8 or 9, the computer should be in a public place. Kids should understand that using a computer is a privilege, not a right."

Schools can also play a role, she says.

Black adds that parents should set clear rules on behavior and build empathy in their kids by having them reach out to those who are different.

As for adults, human nature dictates that people will always lash out at others, whether it's over a perceived insult or simply because of a power differential. Web sites may ban the worst offenders, but they'll almost always pop up elsewhere, using a different name, e-mail address or even computer.

"Some people are just bitter and angry," said psychiatrist Dr. Terry Eagan, medical director of the Moonview Sanctuary in Santa Monica, California. "Sometimes, they're against everyone, other times against a specific group. That person can get really stimulated and can say all sorts of horrible things. But I don't think it's not like they didn't exist before."

Whether the problem will get control of us, or we will get control of the problem, is in the way we face up to it, he says. Anger, he says, is rolled up with anxiety and fear, and nothing creates more fear like a lack of understanding.

"I tell patients that I'd rather know everything about people; information is powerful," he said. "When the climate of the world is more fear-based, it permeates everything."

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

SITES BY VICTIMS OF CYBERPATHS & OTHER PATHOLOGICALS
(we believe many of these people have a right to be upset and using writing as a healing & informational tool for them can be very empowering)

Cyberstalker: Felicity Jane Lowde

Victim of Mike Kennedy Speaks Out

My Psycho Cyberstalker

Too Good To Be Real

Victims of George Gonzalez Speak Out

Victim of Gareth Rodger Speaks Out

Victim of Lissa Daly Speaks Out

Online GangStalking Victim Tells Their Story

Survivor of Mr. Ed

One Victim of 'Sammy Benoit' aka Yidwithlid aka gridney Speaks Out

One Victim of Jason Capozello Speaks Out

One Victim of William Michael Barber Tells Their Story

Victims of Ellen Van Wagoner Speak Out

Victim of Dorothy Chambers Speaks Out

(readers -- if you know of others, please tell us!)

Labels: anger, anonymous, cyberstalking, harassment, narcissistic rage, predators, trolls

“Cyber bullying” is a new term that seems to be a household phrase that is infiltrating many homes with teenagers and young children. While it is important to discuss preventative ways to deter these actions, it’s also important to understand why there has been such an extensive rise of cyber bullying.

Traditional bullying occurs in the classroom or on school grounds, but technologically savvy kids are taking their unsettling words to the Internet through email, MySpace, Facebook, other websites and text and instant messages. Cyber bullies are posting disturbing messages, videos and images of their contacts onto the web where millions of other people can see. Cyber bullies can also remain anonymous on websites and through email messages so the increase of bullies on the web is also rising.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noticed a rise in cyber bullying. In 2000, only nine percent of kids ages 10 to 17 experienced this type of bullying. The percentage has now reached 50 percent for 2008. Another study shows that 64 percent of the teens that said they were the victim of cyber bullying were never bullied at school. There are a few reasons why this rate has increased so much. This age bracket is becoming more technologically savvy as a result of entertainment and their other interests going online. Schools are also teaching students how to use the Internet to acquire help with projects and homework. Social media groups also let these kids create a profile about themselves and easy ways to communicate with others.

i-SAFE Inc., a worldwide leader in Internet safety education, conducted a study to prove the rise of cyber bullying. Their conclusions showed that: 53 percent of the 1500 student surveyed have admitted to saying something mean or hurtful to a person through the Internet; 42 percent of those surveyed have experienced bullying online; and 58 percent of those surveyed have had someone say something hurtful to them online. Even more alarming, 58 percent never told their parents about their experienced with being bullied online.

While it may seem like a simple solution to prevent cyber bullying is to take away all computer privileges, many of today’s kids use these websites and Internet tools as another way of socializing. MySpace cyber bullying is a popular mode because bullies can post hateful information on another person’s profile page or on their own page, or a bully can create a separate profile just about bullying this particular person. Facebook cyber bullying is similar to MySpace cyber bullying because they can create fake identities or create a page with the sole purpose of bullying another person. Twitter is another social media network that is adding to the rise of cyber bullying. A user can “follow” another person to post status updates or send mean messages. Users can also post links to websites about cyber bulling as “helpful” how-to guides.

In extreme cases, kids are learning how to create their own websites, free of charge, to target a while site about bullying individuals. The person gains acceptance with their group of friends because they are humiliating the other person for everyone to see. Then, the bully will use MySpace, Facebook or Twitter to spread the word about additions to their hateful website.

Access to the Internet is also increasing. Local small businesses are offering free wireless Internet access for their customers as a marketing tool to increase their sales. Cell phones offer quick and simple access to the Internet. The Internet is offered in school libraries and classrooms for school work and educational tools. If your child is not allowed on the web while they are at home, of course they are going to find alternative ways to stay connected.

Some social media websites require the child’s email address and password to gain access into their account. This limits the ability for a parent to monitor their navigation through certain sites and some parents just aren’t involved enough to be concerned with what is going on over the internet. Without an open level of communication between child and parent, there may be another life your child is leading without you even knowing.

ORIGINAL

Labels: cyberbully, cyberstalking, defamation, emotional abuse, hurt, libel, slander, smear campaign

The RCMP apologized to the family of John McKendy on Thursday after admitting it had been warned by a relative three days prior to his murder that his son-in-law was a threat.

Assistant Commissioner Darrell LaFosse, the RCMP's commander of J Division in New Brunswick, Canada told a news conference that an independent review will be launched of the force's handling of the case that led to the slaying of the popular 59-year-old university professor.

A spokesman for the force repeatedly told reporters over the past week that family members hadn't approached the Mounties before the murder with concerns over anyone's safety.

"I have since realized that this is not the case," LaFosse said.

"I have personally apologized to the family on behalf of the RCMP in New Brunswick and I am here today to publicly offer my apology for us saying they did not raise concerns. They did," said LaFosse.

"We were investigating those concerns. Any perception they did not make us aware that there were concerns is false. I offer my apology to them for us saying otherwise."

The assistant commissioner said the force received a complaint from an undisclosed family member on Oct. 27, three days before McKendy was killed in his Douglas home.

The complaint concerned threatening emails and other communication from Nicholas Wade Baker, McKendy's 27-year-old son-in-law, to an undisclosed member of the family.

Police believe McKendy was killed by Baker, who was found dead in a rental car outside a Moncton hotel on Saturday.

McKendy's daughter Laura, who was married to Baker, was also injured in the attack.

News of the emails surfaced Monday when one of McKendy's colleagues at St. Thomas University in Fredericton told reporters about them.

Sociology professor Sylvia Hale, a friend of McKendy's who also teaches at St. Thomas University, said earlier this week the McKendy family had received threatening emails from Baker leading up to the murder and had alerted the RCMP.

LaFosse said the warning from the family member was relayed to an investigator but "was not immediately placed on the RCMP file into the investigation."

"The RCMP media person was unaware of this additional information at the time he gave the interviews," LaFosse said.

Insp. Mike O'Malley, District 2 commanding officer, said it was felt at the time the complaint was made that there was not sufficient evidence to proceed with a criminal investigation.

"Nevertheless, the family's concerns were noted and were added to supplement the ongoing investigation," he said.

Police had been seeking Baker since Oct. 3 on charges of fraud, vehicle theft, and credit card theft.

The stolen vehicle and credit card belonged to Michael McKendy, John's brother. The vehicle was later recovered in Bangor, Maine.

Michael McKendy declined comment on the latest developments Thursday, saying: "We may or may not comment in the future."

John McKendy was a Quaker, and is being remembered as a tireless advocate of social justice and non-violence. A memorial service was held at a Fredericton church Wednesday.

The RCMP issued a formal apology to the family for creating the perception "they did not bring forward concerns to the police."

LaFosse said, in addition to the apology, the entire file on Baker leading up to the murder would also be reviewed to see if it was properly handled by police. An RCMP officer from Prince Edward Island will head the investigation.

Several unanswered questions remain, such as how Baker managed to cross back into Canada despite an alert issued to police agencies and border officials that he was wanted in connection with the stolen vehicle and credit card.

O'Malley said they believed Baker was somewhere in the southern United States, far from the McKendy family, when the email threats were reported. Police said the card was used in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina.

Hale said Thursday she was pleased the RCMP apologized to the family and would review the case.

But she said the police should have taken the email threats more seriously, and the standard protocol for dealing with situations of domestic violence must also be reassessed.

She said the police's response in this case is part of "a very widespread pattern of police non-response to these types of situations."

"The reality is that there was a plethora of emails in the last few weeks that showed very significant harassment," she said.

"By just not treating it serious and not responding, they just didn't take it seriously enough.

"What you want them to do is learn from it and say, 'This was a totally inadequate response to this family's situation.'"‚"

LaFosse said the review would begin shortly and the findings would be made public.

ARTICLE

Labels: alerted, cyberstalking, emails, ignored, mcKendy, murder, rcmp, threats

The interesting items from this past year were:

1) Male and female harassers were almost equal - males were 39%, females 30% (the remainder were unknown gender by the victim). We began calculating statistics at WHOA in 2000, and back then 68% of harassers were male. Over the years, we've seen the number of female harassers increasing, which wasn't a total surprise. Most people think they can remain "anonymous" online, which leads to more women harassing not only exes, but complete strangers and not just men - women are being harassed by women more frequently. It's sad when you work on cases with victims and see how a supposed adult female (or male, for that matter) act like immature children.

2) Although only 7% of the cases involved harassment by a family member, what was very surprising was that almost all of those cases involved an estranged *father* as the harasser. Yep, you read right. Scary, isn't it?

3) We saw an increase in how the harassment started by means other than the usual email, message boards, IM and chat. Those include Myspace, Facebook, Craigslist, photo web sites, gaming web sites, blogs, guestbook and forged profiles on dating or other sites.

I always said that as more people went online, more people would be harassed. My prediction is coming true. It's not that people are inherently bad, it's just that the perceived anonymity is what does it. And that the majority of web sites hosting forums, networking, etc do not live up to their terms of service or do not feel they should account for who joins their sites.

Not to pick on any one site in particular, but because of their popularity, Myspace and Facebook are the worst offenders. They do not make you prove you are a real person when you join. If they did (and yes, that would mean more money out of their pockets to institute a viable verification system - which CAN be done) the majority of harassment, bullying, predators and scam artists would significantly decline. Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail and other free email/services need to do the same thing. I have worked on too many cases where someone has opened a free email account, sent the victim harassing/threatening emails, shut down the account, then opened up a new one and kept up the harassment.

For example, my niece and nephew (ages 11 and 9 respectively) have a web sites on Freewebs.com. They're kids. It's a cute site. But in the last few weeks, some idiot has been harassing them, even putting up an anti site encouraging people to put nasty comments on the kids site. Their mom and dad filed complaints with Freewebs, but got no reply. I sent a complaint on their behalf (without mentioning I was their aunt) and got a reply that the subscriber had to file the complaint. When I fired back that they HAD complained and got no response, the offending page was taken down. Then this harasser guessed the kids password (which has since been changed to something I created for them) and put up a nasty page on their site. If Freewebs had taken the complaint seriously when it first was sent, this person wouldn't have gone any further (I would hope). Now I'm fighting with them to be more responsive. Grrr.

If these web sites took some accountability for their services and had a safer environment, responded to users complaints PROMPTLY and verified users, the Internet wouldn't be the sh--hole it's fast becoming. If we, the people, don't stand up and say we're sick and tired of the spammers, scammers, predators, harassers, trolls, bullies and general bad guys online, then you know what will eventually happen? The governments of the world will get together and take control of the Internet and you and I will lose control of a very wonderful thing we've been given.

There are many terrific web sites out there. There are great people out there. But the bad guys discovered a long time ago how to use the Internet for their nefarious ways and it's hurting the rest of us.

I've said my piece. Here's the official press release - Jayne Hitchcock:
~~~~~~~~~~~

Press Contacts:
Jayne Hitchcock,
President of WHOA
whoa@haltabuse.org

Dee Andersson
WHOA PR
whoapr@haltabuse.org
WHOA Press Release #2008-5
For Immediate Release

LEADING ONLINE SAFETY ORGANIZATION RELEASES LATEST CYBERSTALKING STATISTICS

WHOA Shows How Online Trends Have Changed The Past Eight Years
May, 2008 - Working to Halt Online Abuse (WHOA) released their 2007 cyberstalking statistics today, as well as cumulative statistics for the past eight years, from 2000-2007. WHOA is the oldest and largest all-volunteer online safety organization that has been continuously helping adult victims of cyberstalking since 1997. WHOA is the only online organization to provide the most up-to-date cyberstalking statistics and cumulative trends.

WHOA statistics represent cases where victims completed questionnaires in their entirety, but the figures do not represent the total number of cases that are brought to WHOA, which average 50-75 cases each week. All criteria gathered are only from victims who fill out the voluntary demographic information in the questionnaires provided on the WHOA web site at haltabuse.org , thus ensuring comparable and meaningful statistics. WHOA estimates they handle between 50-75 cases a week.

“In addition to victim questionnaires, we work on cases directly with law enforcement, on high profile cases we have been directly approached for, or with victim assistance organizations or lawyers,” notes Jayne Hitchcock, WHOA president. “We don’t see online harassment and cyberstalking disappearing anytime in the foreseeable future. On the contrary, creative, clever and skilled perpetrators develop new twists and turns on a daily basis focused to target new victims. This includes, but is not limited to predators, bullies, and scams. More people go online for the first time each and every single day, making them vulnerable to the ‘bad guys’ out there. Currently there are over one billion people online worldwide – if only one percent become victims, that’s ten million people!”

The trust WHOA earns from victims they have helped enables the group to develop reliable cyberstalking demographic numbers. However, as the statistics are generated from information supplied by the victims, verification is not always possible. WHOA bases their cyberstalking statistics on a total of 2,285 completed questionnaires over the past eight years, 249 of those from 2007. Although females are still the primary victims, with males as the primary harassers, male victims and female harassers have significantly increased over the years. : The complete statistics are located on the WHOA Web site.

• Both Male and Female harassers in 2007 were almost dead even, where there was a significant 10% difference between the two last year, with males being the primary harasser. This significant trend shows that the perceived anonymity of the Internet provides female harassers with an opportunity to terrorize victims of both sexes.

• In 2007, WHOA saw a decrease in victims aged 18-30, from 40% to 28%, and victims aged 31-40, from 29% in 2006 down to 24%, while those aged 41 and over was about the same. However, many victims were relunctant to reveal their ages last year, an increase of over 15% over 2006.

• More than half of the victims did not know their harassers last year, reinforcing the fact that not all online stalking victims are being harassed by an ex.

• However, those who did know their harasser saw a marked decrease in the “ex” factor – while 47% were harassed by an ex in 2006, only 31% were harassed by an ex last year.

• A surprising change were victims harassed by a family member – an increase of almost 9%. WHOA received complaints of victims being harassed not only by co-workers, employees, fellow students, teachers, or friends, but also roommates, customers and case involving co-owners of a business who had a falling out.

• California, repeated it’s position of being number one when it comes to victims and harassers, which hasn’t changed over the last eight years (except for 2000, when Texas was the number one location for harassers). Canada took 2nd place for the third year in a row for victims, and swapped places with New York as the 2nd location of harassers last year.

• Email still remained the primary way victims were contacted by harassers, no matter where they encountered their harasser previously, with an increase of 5% over the previous year. Email was followed by message boards (which includes forums, groups and usenet), Instant Messaging (IM), Web sites, chat, Myspace and eBay. . Other ways harassment began included Craigslist, photo Web sites, online gaming, blogs, forged profiles and Facebook.

• Online escalation of the harassment sharply rose from 40.5% to 600% between 2004 and 2005, dropped to 44% in 2006 and then increased again in 2007 to 55%.

• The escalation included (in this order) email, message boards, impersonation (forged profiles on social networking, dating and personal ad sites), IM, Web sites, Craigslist, chat, Myspace, blogs and text messages (via cell phones).

• Offline harassment/ physical violence threats went up to 24% versus 22% last year but the number of victims who reported harassment to law enforcement, the harasser’s Internet service provider (ISP) or someone else dropped from last year’s 72.5% to 59% in 2007.

• Only 44% of the cases involved victims and harassers located in the same state or country

WHOA successfully resolved 74% of the cases they received in 2007. These sometimes involved multiple actions, which included WHOA contacting the ISP, web host, moderator or other online entity; or the victim made changes, such as their password, username, email address, profiles or changing options in their online account. In the 26% of cases WHOA couldn’t resolve, victims were either referred to law enforcement or a lawyer, or it wasn’t a case (usually spam).

So, why do online harassers do it? According to WHOA President Jayne Hitchcock,

“it is practically impossible to know exactly what triggers someone to do what they do online. For the stranger-on-stranger cases, just like road rage on the highway, you don’t know why that person starts chasing someone else in their car. It’s the same thing on the information superhighway, what I call‘Internet road rage,’ – you don’t know what someone starts harassing someone online and ‘chasing’ them online.

It could start with an innocent statement that the harasser perceives as a personal insult or injustice, or it may be the result of faulty information, rumor, jealousy, inflated ego, or just a result of a simple misunderstanding that escalated and grew to become a serious problem.”

WHOA president Jayne Hitchcock is a cyber crime expert who trains law enforcement from the local to federal level, and assists the US Department of Justice Office (USDJO) for Victims of Crime and National Center for Victims of Crime. She trains advocate groups, conducts seminars, raises awareness of cyber crime and harassment and lectures educators, librarians, parents and students at middle schools, high schools, colleges and universities about the dangers of bullies, predators, stalkers and online social networking sites. She has appeared as an expert in various media, including America’s Most Wanted, PEOPLE magazine, Primetime Thursday with Diane Sawyer, TIME magazine, the Associated Press, The Montel Williams Show, A&E’s Investigative Reports, 48 Hours, Ladies Home Journal, Campus Security Reports, Inside Edition, Good Morning America and CNN. Her latest book, Net Crimes & Misdemeanors 2nd editon, highlights online crimes, how to be safer online and what to do if you are victimized.

Video Professor recently released a 3-CD tutorial based on the book.

To interview Hitchcock, please contact her via email whoa@haltabuse.org. Statistics may be quoted in media and on web sites with appropriate recognition to WHOA. To learn more about WHOA, or if you know someone who needs help, please visit the web site.

Net Crimes & Misdemeanors: 2007 Cyberstalking Statistics Released

Labels: cyberstalking, internet road rage, jayne hitchcock, trolls, whoa