By David Simms, Senior Contributor
The Global Institute for Cyber Safety and Standards
Cyber-stalking is generally not a gender, cultural, or other group-specific phenomenon. It can be inflicted by anybody with an internet connection and can be received by anybody via the same. Whether the stalker has a particular personal grudge against their target or they enjoy the psychological high and sense of control they experience when damaging and harassing the lives of others they don’t know or have a personal connection to has no bearing on propensity toward any one group over another.
The latest statistics show that cyber-harassment is experienced almost equally among all groups. There are also interesting statistics showing people who have recently moved from one country to another, or whose parents are immigrants to a new country, experience a slightly higher frequency of internet harassment. Many in this group are also more likely to be perpetrators of the bullying and harassment. It is speculated that this has something to do with being a defense mechanism to preempt attacks against themselves.
