Cyberstalking: Dangers on the Information Superhighway
By: Trudy M. Gregorie, Director of Training
National Center for Victims of Crime
Although there is no universally accepted definition of cyberstalking,
the term is generally used to refer to the use of the Internet, e-mail,
or other telecommunication technologies to harass or stalk another person.
It is not the mere annoyance of unsolicited e-mail. It is methodical,
deliberate, and persistent. The communications, whether from someone known
or unknown, do not stop even after the recipient has asked the sender
to cease all contacts, and are often filled with inappropriate, and sometimes
disturbing, content. Essentially, cyberstalking is an extension of the
physical form of stalking.
Most state and federal stalking laws require that the stalker make a direct
threat of violence against the victim, while some require only that the
alleged stalker’s course of conduct constitute an implied threat.
Although some cyberstalking conduct involving annoying or menacing behavior
might fall short of illegal stalking under current laws, such behavior
may be a prelude to real-life stalking and violence and should be treated
seriously. Cyberstalking has the potential to move from a URL address
to a real address—from virtual to actual.
In a 1999 U.S. Department of Justice report, Cyberstalking: A New Challenge
for Law Enforcement and Industry, cyberstalking is identified as a growing
problem.1 According to the report, there are currently more
than 80 million adults and 10 million children with access to the Internet
in the United States. Assuming the proportion of cyberstalking victims
is even a fraction of the proportion of persons who have been the victims
of off-line stalking within the preceding 12 months, the report estimates
there may potentially be tens or even hundreds of thousands of cyberstalking
victims in the United States.
Criminal Conduct
Experienced prosecutors are also beginning to recognize the dangers on
the information superhighway. Linda Fairstein, Chief of the Sex Crimes
Unit in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and a Board member
of the National Center for Victims of Crime, has said, "By the use
of new technology and equipment which cannot be policed by traditional
methods, cyberstalking has replaced traditional methods of stalking and
harassment. In addition, cyberstalking has led to off-line incidents of
violent crime. Police and prosecutors need to be aware of the escalating
numbers of these events and devise strategies to resolve these problems
through the criminal justice system."2
Cyberstalking victims who call the National Center for Victims of Crime
often complain of not being taken seriously or of not even being recognized
as victims by law enforcement agencies they have contacted. Responding
to a victim’s complaint by saying "you can’t be hurt on
the Internet—it’s just words" or "just turn off your
computer" is not acceptable or responsible. It’s unreasonable
to expect cyberstalking victims to walk away from their on-line activities,
which may comprise their professional career, in order to avoid this kind
of problem. On-line harassment and threats are just as frightening and
distressing as off-line harassment and threats.
A recent incident described in the Cyberstalking Report from the U.S.
Attorney General is typical of the lack of law enforcement training and
expertise that can be so frustrating for victims.3 A woman complained
to a local police agency that a man had been posting information on the
Internet claiming that her nine-year-old daughter was available for sex,
and including their home phone number with instructions to call 24 hours
a day. Numerous calls were received. Although every call was reported
to local police by the family, the police officer simply advised them
to change their phone number. Subsequently, the Federal Bureau of Investigation
was contacted and they opened an investigation. The FBI discovered that
the local police agency did not have a computer expert, and the responding
police officer had never been on the Internet. The local agency’s
lack of familiarity and resources may have resulted in a failure to understand
the seriousness of the problem and the options available to law enforcement
to respond.
The lack of state-of-the-art technology and an adequately trained, experienced
workforce are two of the greatest challenges for law enforcement and prosecutors
faced with investigating and trying cybercrime cases. The criminal justice
system must become more sensitive to cyberstalking complaints, and the
genuine threat that such stalking poses, and must devote the necessary
training and resources to allow proper investigation and prosecution.
Ready Access
The only thing a cyberstalker needs is access to a computer and a modem.
Due to the enormous amount of personal information available through the
Internet, a cyberstalker can easily locate private information about a
potential victim with a few mouse clicks or key strokes. Information is
power, and stalking of any kind is all about power and control. There
is little security on-line. Turning on a computer can expose anyone to
harassment. Everyone who receives e-mail or uses the Internet is susceptible
to cyberstalking.
Internet users are most vulnerable in cyberspace areas in which they interact
with others. These include chat or Internet relay chat lines, message
boards or newsgroups, where Internet users post messages back and forth,
and users’ e-mail boxes. E-mail harassment usually begins with initial
contact in live chat or newsgroup situations.
Techniques
Cyberstalkers use a variety of techniques. They may initially use the
Internet to identify and track their victims. They may then send unsolicited
e-mail, including hate, obscene, or threatening mail. Live chat harassment
abuses the victim directly or through electronic sabotage (for example,
flooding the Internet chat channel to disrupt the victim’s conversation).
With newsgroups, the cyberstalker can create postings about the victim
or start rumors that spread through the bulletin board system. Cyberstalkers
may also set up a web page on the victim with personal or fictitious information
or solicitations to readers.
Another technique is to assume the victim’s persona on-line, such
as in chat rooms, for the purpose of sullying the victim’s reputation,
posting details about the victim, or soliciting unwanted contacts from
others. More complex forms of harassment include mailbombs (mass messages
that virtually shutdown the victim’s e-mail system by clogging it),
sending the victim computer virii, or sending electronic junk mail (spamming).
There is a clear difference between the annoyance of unsolicited e-mail
and on-line harassment. Unsolicited e-mail is to be expected from time
to time. However, cyberstalking is a course of conduct that takes place
over a period of time and involves repeated, deliberate attempts to cause
distress to the victim.
People who do not have access to the Internet, or who choose not to go
on-line, are not immune from cyberbased crime. Databases of personal information
available on the Internet can enable a stalker to trace a victim’s
user name to their real name, address, telephone number, and other personal
information, or can enable a stalker to impersonate the victim on-line.
The offender can then harass the victim on the computer via e-mail or
at home through mail, telephone calls, or even by appearing at the victim’s
home or workplace. Telecommunication technologies also make it much easier
for a cyberstalker to encourage third parties to harass and/or threaten
a victim.
For example, in the first successful prosecution under California’s
new cyberstalking law, prosecutors in the Los Angeles District Attorney’s
Office obtained a guilty plea from a 50-year old former security guard
who used the Internet to solicit the rape of a woman who rejected his
romantic advances. The defendant terrorized his 28-year old victim, who
had never been on-line and did not even own a computer, by impersonating
her in various Internet chat rooms and on-line bulletin boards, where
he posted, along with her phone number and address, messages that she
fantasized about being raped.
On at least six occasions, sometimes in the middle of the night, men knocked
on the victim’s door offering to rape her in response to the Internet
"personal ad." The defendant pleaded guilty in April 1999 to
one count of stalking and three counts of solicitation of sexual assault.
As a result of the stalker’s actions, the victim was eventually forced
from her apartment, lost her job, suffered significant weight loss, and
developed a fear of going outside of her residence.4
Most of the cyberstalking cases that have been prosecuted did not involve
technically complex forms of stalking, and e-mail was simply being used
as an alternative form of communication. However, this is not always the
case. The availability of anonymizing software provides a high degree
of protection for stalkers seeking to cover their tracks more effectively.
Examples of these types of technologies are "anonymous re-mailers,"
which automatically shield the sender’s identity with pseudonyms
and send the e-mail through servers that instantly erase digital tracks
to prevent later access by anyone, even law enforcement.
Another
example is Stratfor’s Shredder, a software program for Windows 95
that acts like an electronic paper shredder that automatically overwrites
deleted files, including all the routine computer backups.5 The more complex
software and computer technologies become, the easier it is for cyberstalkers
to operate anonymously, and the more difficult it is for law enforcement
to investigate and collect enough evidence to support prosecutions.
In order to address cyberstalking, it is critical to understand stalking
in general. In many cases, cyberstalking is simply another phase in an
overall stalking pattern, or it is regular stalking behavior using new
technological tools. Therefore, strategies and interventions that have
been developed to respond to off-line stalking can often be adapted to
on-line stalking situations. There are federal, state, and local criminal
justice agencies which have begun to focus on stalking, and some have
recently developed special task forces to deal with cyberstalking.
Effects
As with all stalking, the greatest trauma is the faceless terror that
it brings into a victim’s life—24 hours a day, seven days a
week. The Internet becomes an electronic curtain behind which the stalker
hides while terrorizing the victim at home and work, with friends and
neighbors, and with countless people that the victim does not even know.
Cyberstalkers may be located on the other side of the world, across the
country, across the street, or in the next cubicle at work. They could
be a former friend or lover, a total stranger met in a chat room, or simply
a teenager playing a practical joke. The inability to identify the source
of the harassment or threats is one of the most ominous aspects of this
crime for a cyberstalking victim.
The fact that cyberstalking does not involve physical contact may create
the misperception that it is less threatening or dangerous than physical
stalking. Cyberstalking is just as frightening and potentially dangerous
as a stalker at the victim’s front door. The psychological torment
is very real, even in the absence of a distinct physical threat. It totally
disrupts a victim’s life and peace of mind.
Cyberstalking presents a range of physical, emotional, and psychological
trauma for the victim, who may begin to develop or experience:
•
Sleep
disturbances;
•
Recurring
nightmares;
•
Eating
pattern disturbances;
•
Hypervigilance;
•
High
levels of stress;
•
A feeling
of being out of control; and/or
•
A pervasive
sense of the loss of personal safety.
Recent Responses
On January 10, 2000, in a keynote speech, U.S. Attorney General Janet
Reno described the Internet and other information technologies as bringing
enormous benefits to society, yet also providing new opportunities for
criminal behavior. She proposed a round-the-clock cybercrime network of
crime enforcement personnel, regional computer forensic laboratories to
analyze seized computers for evidence of unlawful activity, and a secure
on-line clearinghouse that would allow federal, state, and local law enforcement
to share information about cybercases.6
As part of the 2000 Violence Against Women Act, Congress extended the
federal interstate stalking statute to include cyberstalking, 18 U.S.C.
§2261 A. In 2000, Congress also passed the Amy Boyer’s Law,
42 U.S.C. Section 1320 B – 23 (P.L. 106 – 553), which prohibits
the sale or display of an individual’s social security number to
the public, including sales over the Internet, without the person’s
expressed consent, submitted either electronically or in writing. The
law allows a person harmed by wrongful release of a social security number
to sue the seller or displayer for equitable relief and monetary damages
in U.S. district court. In addition, the Social Security Commissioner
can impose on any such violator a civil penalty of $5,000 for each violation,
with increased penalties (maximum of $50,000) if the violations constitute
a general business practice. This new law applies to violations effective
on December 21, 2002, two years after its enactment.
Amy Boyer’s Law is named after a young woman who was murdered after
her stalker purchased her social security number over the Internet. With
that information, he was able to locate her license plate number and place
of employment. He detailed his plans to kill her on a web site posted
under her name. Within minutes of his last web site entry, he drove to
her workplace and executed her as she got into her car.
States have also begun to respond to cyberstalking by adding provisions
to their current stalking and harassment laws that criminalize "stalking
by electronic means" or "the use of computer equipment for the
purposes of stalking."7
About half of the states currently have language in their laws that specifically
address harassing electronic, computer, or e-mail communications. Other
states’ laws contain broad language that can be interpreted to encompass
cyberstalking behavior. Some have statutes prohibiting harassment via
computer contact, while others have stalking statutes that include electronic
communications. A few have both stalking and harassment statutes that
encompass electronic communications. Other states have laws, outside of
stalking or harassment, that criminalize computer communications or e-mail
misuse. Some have statutes that prohibit making threats through e-mail
or "electronically submitted communications."
Resources
Victims of on-line harassment and threats, often in collaboration with
victim service providers, have had to fill the void of available resources
and assistance by developing their own informal support networks and informational
web sites to share strategies about how to respond to these crimes. One
such program is Women Halting Online Abuse (WHOA), which was founded by
women to educate the Internet community about on-line harassment. WHOA
also educates the on-line community to develop web site resources, including
the creation of a safe-site and unsafe-site list to enable Internet users
to make informed decisions, and providing information about how users
can protect themselves against on-line harassment.
You can contact WHOA at:
www.haltabuse.org
E-mail address: whoa@femail.com; whoa@haltabuse.org
Other on-line resources include:
CyberAngels: A nonprofit group devoted to assisting victims of
on-line harassment and stalking.
www.cyberangels.org
Safety Ed International: A nonprofit organization assisting the
Internet community and providing specific advice, resources, and information
to victims being harassed or stalked on-line.
www.safetyed.org
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse: A nonprofit consumer and advocacy
program that offers consumers a unique opportunity to learn how to protect
their personal privacy. PRC’s services include a hotline for consumers
to report privacy abuses and to request information on ways to protect
their privacy. They have also produced fact sheets on privacy issues including
Factsheet # 14, entitled "Are You Being Stalked? Tips for Your Protection"
and Factsheet # 18, entitled, "Privacy in Cyberspace."
www.privacyrights.org
Online Privacy Alliance: A coalition of more than 80 global companies
and associations committed to promoting the privacy of individuals on-line.
Its purpose is to define privacy policy for the new electronic medium
and foster an on-line environment that respects consumer privacy. Available
on this web site are resources for consumers, model Internet privacy policies,
and news stories about recent on-line privacy violations and issues.
www.privacyalliance.com
Network Solutions’ WHOIS: An Internet company which provides
searches in its registrar database to assist persons in determining the
contents of a domain name registration record found in the header of a
received e-mail. The result will provide the contact information for sender’s
Internet service provider.
www.networksolutions.com/cgi-bin/whois/whois
Federal Trade Commission, Consumer Affairs Department: A resource
site for consumer information from the federal government, including contact
information if you have been the victim of identity theft or misuse of
a social security number and fraudulent credit card accounts.
www.consumer.gov/idtheft
FTC hotline: 877-IDTHEFT
Social Security Number Fraud Line: 1-800-269-0271
Recommendations for Victims of On-line Stalking
If you are being harassed on-line, there are several things you should
do:
1. If you are under 18, tell your parents or an adult you trust that you
are being harassed or threatened. Do not keep this to yourself. Parents
must know what is going on to be able to help and support you.
2. If you are getting harassing e-mail, get a new account or request a
new log-on name and password from your Internet service provider. Close
your old account. Learn how to use the filtering capabilities of your
e-mail program to block e-mail from certain addresses.
3. Save every piece of communication you get from the cyberstalker. Save
all of the header information you can if it’s an e-mail or newsgroup
posting. Print a hard copy, and copy the communication to a disk for documentation.
4. Start a log of each communication explaining the situation in more
detail. Document how the harassment is affecting your life and what steps
you’re taking to stop it.
5. Once and only once, contact your harasser directly and state in simple,
strong, and formal terms to stop contacting you and/or posting anything
about you. State that the communications are unwanted and inappropriate,
and that you will take further action if it does not stop. E-mail a copy
to the system administrator of your Internet service provider. Save copies
of these communications, and note that you sent them in your log.
6. If you receive harassing on-line messages and it is possible to trace
the origin of the unwanted message and you have informed the sender that
you do not want to be contacted, you may want to consider reporting the
on-line stalker to the Internet service provider (ISP) because many ISPs
have policies that prohibit the use of their services to harass or abuse
another person. Some ISPs may be willing to cancel the stalker’s
account.
If you receive abusive e-mail, identify the domain (letters after the
@ sign) and contact the ISP. Most ISPs have an e-mail address such as
abuse@[domain name] or postmaster@[domain name] that can be used for complaints.
If that does not work, you can usually find contact addresses by going
to www.networksolutions.com/cgi-bin/whois/whois (do a "who is"
search on whatever ISP you need). If e-mail complaints don’t work,
make a phone call. Save copies of these communications, and note all contacts
in your log.
Keep in mind, however, that this may be just a short-term fix or may even
exacerbate the situation if the stalker discovers that you notified the
ISP. [Under those circumstances, he/she may attempt to retaliate against
you or begin/continue to stalk you off-line. Regardless of whether the
on-line stalking ceases, you need to be aware that the stalker may have
obtained personal information on you via the Internet or through other
sources, and, consequently, you may be still at risk for off-line stalking,
in which case you need to do appropriate safety planning.]
7. Contact your local police. Report every incident of on-line abuse and
provide the police with copies of evidence you have collected. Save copies
of any police incident reports, and note each contact to law enforcement
in your log. If the stalker is out of state, you should also contact your
local office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Call the FBI Computer Crimes Unit in your local area. [The Federal Interstate
Stalking and Prevention Act, 18 U.S.C. Section 2261A, was amended in 2000
to cover on-line stalking as well as stalking by phone and mail. Also,
some on-line stalking cases may fall under 18 U.S.C. Section 875, Interstate
Communications (to make threats to physically harm or kidnap another person
in interstate communications is a felony) or 47 U.S.C. Section 223, Obscene
or Harassing Telephone Calls in Interstate Communications.]
In order to better protect yourself on-line:
1. Use a gender-neutral screen name.
2. Never give your password to anyone, especially if someone sends you
an instant message (IM).
3. Don’t provide your credit card number or other identifying information
as proof of age to access or subscribe to a web site run by a company
with which you are unfamiliar.
4. Tell children not give out their real name, address, or phone number
over the Internet without permission.
5. Use a free e-mail account such as Hotmail (www.hotmail.com) or YAHOO!
(www.yahoo.com) to pass messages in newsgroups, mailing listings, enter
chat rooms, fill out forms, or correspond with someone you don’t
know well.
6. Don’t give your primary e-mail address out to anyone you don’t
know.
7. Spend time on newsgroups, mailing lists, and chat rooms as a "silent"
observer before "speaking" or posting messages.
8. When you do participate on-line, only type what you would say to someone
in person.
9. Don’t respond to e-mail from a stranger; when you reply, you are
verifying your e-mail address to the sender.
10. On a regular basis (at least once a month), type your name into Internet
search engines to see what information, if any, pops up. To have your
name removed from any directories, contact each search engine on which
you are listed and request to be removed.
(Tips #1 – 8 were developed by the George Mason
University Sexual Assault Services, 1999.)
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2002 by the National Center for Victims of Crime. This
information may be freely distributed, provided that it is distributed
free of charge, in its entirety and includes this copyright notice.
From the Desk of the Director: Eliminating “Cyber-confusion”
From the Newsletter of the Stalking Resource Center, Volume 3, Number
2, Summer 2003
Recently, the term “cyberstalking” seems to be cropping up everywhere.
But no one seems to know exactly what it means. Is it stalking by computer?
By hidden cameras? By email? Is it cyberstalking to use a cell phone or
pager to track someone? What technologies are really covered by cyberstalking?
And why should anyone care?
The law rests on the accurate use of terms. For more than a decade, advocates
and legislators have struggled to define stalking and write laws to prosecute
stalkers. Now that all states have passed anti-stalking laws, law enforcement
professionals, as well as the public, are starting to share a common understanding
of the elements and definition of stalking.
Stalking takes many forms. Stalkers can physically follow their victims.
They can use phones, the U.S. Postal Service, couriers, and even florists
to track and pressure their prey. Stalkers can also bombard their victims
with instant messages, photograph them with hidden cameras, install surveillance
software on their computers, and use global positioning systems (GPS)
to track them in their cars. But no matter what tools they use, stalkers
are still stalkers.
So what’s wrong with describing technology-aided stalking as “cyberstalking”?
On the surface, the term seems harmless. But a closer look suggests a
few problems. “Cyber” usually refers to the Internet. The term
may be stretched to encompass all use of computers. But it does not cover
the use of many other forms of technology. So it’s inaccurate to
describe stalking with GPS or a camera as cyberstalking. Some states have
passed cyberstalking statutes to cover stalking via email, websites, and
chat rooms (that require computers). But what happens when attorneys try
to apply cyberstalking statutes to technology that the statutes do not
address? Some confusion is inevitable.
Although most professionals now use computers, many are still intimidated
by the complexity of technology. Many stalking-savvy law enforcement officers,
prosecutors, or advocates hesitate to get involved in a case described
as cyberstalking because they are not experts in the inner workings of
a computer. The term “cyber” distracts them from what they already
know about stalking laws and how to build a case. They forget that they
can hire technology experts to explain how new technologies operate. What
is most important for criminal justice professionals is to understand
the basics and dynamics of stalking and, in general, how their state statutes
address technology. Building on such a foundation, they can prosecute
the ever-evolving forms of stalking with technology.
To deal effectively with technology’s impact on stalking, we, as
criminal justice professionals should make sure our language is appropriate.
Instead of getting hung up on cyberstalking, why don’t we just` say
“the use of technology to stalk”? That way, the crime is clear,
and “technology” covers the host of tools the stalker can use
(now and in the future) to commit their crimes. Once we’ve defined
our terms, law enforcement can go back to catching stalkers, Merriam-Webster
can wrestle with “cyber,” and we can all return to our computers
with renewed confidence.
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2002 by the National Center for Victims
of Crime. This information may be freely distributed, provided that it
is distributed free of charge, in its entirety and includes this copyright
notice.
Cyberstalking
presents a range of physical, emotional, and psychological trauma for
the victim, who may begin to develop or experience:
Sleep disturbances;
Recurring nightmares;
Eating pattern disturbances;
Hypervigilance;
High levels of stress;
A feeling of being out of control;
A pervasive sense of the loss of personal safety.
In order
to better protect yourself on-line:
1. Use a gender-neutral screen name.
2. Never give your password to anyone, especially if someone sends you
an instant message (IM).
3. Don’t provide your credit card number or other identifying information
as proof of age to access or subscribe to a web site run by a company
with which you are unfamiliar.
4. Tell children not give out their real name, address, or phone number
over the Internet without permission.
5. Use a free e-mail account such as Hotmail (www.hotmail.com) or YAHOO!
(www.yahoo.com) to pass messages in newsgroups, mailing listings, enter
chat rooms, fill out forms, or correspond with someone you don’t
know well.
6. Don’t give your primary e-mail address out to anyone you don’t
know.
7. Spend time on newsgroups, mailing lists, and chat rooms as a "silent"
observer before "speaking" or posting messages.
8. When you do participate on-line, only type what you would say to someone
in person.
9. Don’t respond to e-mail from a stranger; when you reply, you are
verifying your e-mail address to the sender.
10. On a regular basis (at least once a month), type your name into Internet
search engines to see what information, if any, pops up. To have your
name removed from any directories, contact each search engine on which
you are listed and request to be removed.