Cyber Stalking

Although there is no any accepted definition of the term cyber stalking, the word used in the report refers to the use of Internet like an e-mail, or any other electronic communication devices to stalk any other person. The word stalking generally involves harassing or threatening behavior of an individual person repeatedly, like a person is  appearing in a person’s home or place of business, making phone calls of harassing , leaving messages in written or any objects. 

How do they Operate
Nature and Extent of Cyber stalking
Prevention TipsWhat To Do If You Are Being Stalked ?

Some people conduct cyber stalking involving annoying behavior might fall short of illegal stalking; such behavior might be a prelude for stalking and violence and should be treated seriously.

There are both kind of Stalkers they are Online & Offline both have desires to control the life of victim’s life. In a majority numbers of stalkers are those who are rejected by their love or they might be ex-lovers, who wanted to harass the victim just because they failed in satisfying their secret desires. Mostly stalkers are men and victim female.

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Stalkers collect all the personal information of the victim such as their name, background of the family, telephone numbers of both place of their residence and work, about their daily routine and the date of birth etc. If the stalker is one acquaintance to the victim he can easily get all these information. If stalker is someone stranger to victim then he try to collects the information from sources like internet through various profiles, the victim might have filled in while opening the chat box or an e-mail account or while signing in on an account with some of the websites.

Stalker may post the information on any website related to porn-services or online dating services, posing as if the victim is posting this information and invite the people to call the victim on her telephone numbers to have sexual services. Stalker even might uses very obscene language to invite the person who are interested .

All kind of people from nook and corner of the World, who come to know about this information, start calling the victim at her residence and/or work place, asking for sexual or any other relationships.

Stalkers subscribe the e-mail account of the victim to pornographic sites and because of which victim starts receiving such kind of e-mails.

Some stalkers keep on sending repeated e-mails asking for the various kinds of favors for the  victim.

In an online stalking the stalker can also make the third party to easily harass the victim .

Stalkers follow the victims from board to board.

Stalkers make their contacts with victims through letters it might love, threatening, or sexually explicit. Stalkers might use many times multiple types of names while contacting the victim.

Contact victim through their telephone. If the stalker is able to access the victim’s telephone, he will many times make calls to the victim to threaten or harass them. Stalkers track the victim to his/her home.

The fact is cyber stalking does not involve any types of physical contact may create the misperception this is not necessarily true. As now a day the Internet becomes an ever more integral part of our personal and professional lives, stalkers always take advantage of the ease of communications as well as increased access to personal information. In an addition, the ease of use and non-confrontational, impersonal, and sometimes anonymous nature of Internet communications might remove disincentives to cyber stalking. As on physical stalking, online harassment and threats may be a prelude in a more serious behavior, including physical violence.

Never share your  personal information in a public place anywhere online, or don’t give it to any strangers, including an e-mail or chat rooms.

Never use your  real name nor your nickname as your permanently screen name or user ID.  

Pick  one of a name that is gender and age neutral and don’t post any personal information as a part of any user profiles.

Please be very cautious about meeting online acquaintances in person. If you choose to meet, do so in a public place and take along a friend or your family member with you . 

Make it sure that your ISP and Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network have an acceptable use of policy that prohibits the cyber stalking. And if the network fails to respond to your complaints, consider switching to a provider that is more responsive for user complaints.

 If the situation becomes hostile online ,log off immediately . If the situation places you in a fear, contact one of your local law enforcement agency.

If you are receiving the unwanted contact, make it clear to that  the person that you would like him or her not to contact you again.

Save all the communications for evidence. Don’t try to edit them in any way. Always keep a record of your contacts with Internet system administrators or officials of law enforcement .

You might want to consider the blocking or filtering messages from the harasser. Many e-mail programs such as Microsoft Outlook have a filter feature, and software can be easily obtained that will automatically delete the e-mails from a particular e-mail address or that contain an offensive words. Chat room contact can also be blocked as well. Although formats differ, through  a common chat room command to block someone you would have to type ignore [without the brackets].

However, in some of the circumstances, on threats of violence, it may be more appropriated to save the information and contact law enforcement authorities.

If harassment still continues after you have asked the person to stop it , contact the harasser's Internet Service Provider immediately . Most ISP's have the very clear policies prohibiting the use of their services to abuse another person.

Often, an ISP can also try to stop the conduct by direct contact through the stalker or through closing their account. If you receive an abusive e-mails, identify the domain of a "@" sign and contact that ISP. Most of them have an e-mail address such as abuse@ particular domain name or master@ domain name that can be used for complaints. If the ISP has a website, visit it for the information on how to file a complaint.