What are the risks of cyberbullying ?

Cyberbullying can often be more dangerous than traditional forms of bullying. It can happen anywhere and anytime and the abuser does not have to face his victims. This means that attacks are often more vicious and cruel. The victim may not know who the bully is or why he was targeted. This is the danger of anonymity on the Internet. Cyberbullying, like all forms of bullying, can be extremely damaging to an individual's self-confidence, social skills and self-confidence.

If you are worried that your child has been a victim of cyberbullying, you should be aware of the following behavioral symptoms:

• Low self-esteem.
• Spend a lot of time alone and move away from family, friends and social situations.
• Refuses to go to school or make excuses to stay home.
• Keep mobile phones and laptops hidden from parents and family members.
• Weight loss or changes in appearance.
• Any new skin marks that may indicate self-harming behavior.
• Dress in a way that may indicate that they are trying to hide self-harming tendencies, such as long sleeves and pants when it is hot outside.

In severe situations, when cyberbullying continues to go unnoticed and left untreated, individuals may attempt suicide. Therefore, it is important that you know how to identify cyberbullying so that it is not observed. You need to know how to help victims feel supported and how to report bullying behavior to prevent attacks.

How to stop cyberbullying

Posts on social media or messaging applications can go viral almost instantly. Hundreds of thousands of people can see anything ugly or offensive that someone is talking about, sometimes within minutes of the original post. You should therefore advise children not to provide any personal or harmful information about themselves to their friends. Instead, if they really need to trust someone, they should find a trusted adult.

Explain to them that there are measures they can take to protect themselves against cyberbullying.

In order to prevent cyberbullying, it is important that you advise young people to:

• Keep all your passwords confidential. Young people should never disclose this personal information, even if that is their "best friend".
• If not in use, sign up from all your social media accounts.
• Never open any messages from people they don't know or from people they know regularly who are being bullied. Opening unsolicited text messages could lead them to computer viruses, which can infect devices and collect sensitive personal information, which can then be used to blackmail, embarrass or disturb them.
• Make sure the privacy controls are installed on all your computer and social media settings. Privacy settings help you control who can see your profile and photos, and send you messages.
• Save all "PG" photos. Sharing and sharing sexually rude photos, even if they think the recipient is a trusted person, puts other people with bullets against them.

How to report cyberbullying

If you find that someone has received a cyberbullying message, it is important to advise them not to respond to, forward or delete the message.

It is important that they keep this report as evidence of cyberbullying behavior. The more evidence you can get, the better. Advise the victim to stop the perpetrator and record the time, date and description of the attack. You should also take screenshots and print copies of cyberbullying. You can use hard copies to report cyberbullying behavior to mobile phone and web service providers.

You can report a cyberbullying attack in two places:

1.  Cyberbaap: For report report@cyberbaap.org Timing Mon - Sat | 10:00 - 19:00.
2.  Social Networking Websites: If bullying occurs on a social media platform, you should report the incident directly to that platform. Many social media sites have a way of reporting behavior that breaks their code of conduct.