Through these practices, the prevalence and low cost of smartphones, and emergent understanding of social issues around privacy and control, ‘cyber bullying’ has emerged.
This is a form of harassment in which people make use of the Internet, cellphones or other technologies to post text or images intended to hurt or embarrass another person (Moessner 2007).
Unlike ‘traditional’ forms of bullying, cyber bullying doesn’t involve physical violence—although it may allude to the threat of physical harm—but instead focuses on threats, rumor and gossip (Wolack et al. 2007).
Victims may have embarrassing or compromising photos of themselves posted onto social networking sites such as Facebook, or be sent abusive and threatening text messages.
In an important minority of cases the perpetrator is anonymous which can cause further distress to the victim (Ybarra et al. 2007).
Cyber bullying is not just a schoolyard problem but a system of abuse that continues out of the high school and onto campus, with between 10 and 15 % of university students reporting online harassment (Finn 2004).