“Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.”

Many are familiar with this old adage — usually a response or defence mechanism to an insult. But, it’s 2016 and if anything is able to refute this, its cyber bullying.

The technology era has presented many changes to contend with, the typical hallway, recess, or football field bullies are things of the past. We now live in an era where community is everything and people are essentially a product of their social relationships, including online interactions. Even businesses have quickly learnt and, unfortunately, succumbed to the far-reaching effects of a 145-character Tweet that went viral.

If one bad review has the potential to cripple a business or even cause high-ranking officials to resign from their office after many years, then what about a teen that has just a little over a decade of existence? There is no debate as to the chilling effects of certain behaviours in the cyber world. One can also only imagine the impact it may have on our children in school today.

Cyber bullying refers to when people utilise technology, usually social media, such as Twitter, Facebook, SnapChat and Whatsapp, to attack another person on the internet (cyberspace).

Recently, especially in schools and given the prevalence of social media and internet access, this has become a very serious issue and can lead to behavioural and psychological issues for vulnerable people — particularly teens.

Research has shown that for every 10 people bullied, three will self harm, one will have a failed suicide attempt, and one will develop an eating disorder. Many teens get depressed, entertain suicidal thoughts, and suffer from anxiety, self— esteem and other social issues stemming from bullying.

But, what has been done to tackle cyber bullying?

The Cybercrime Act of 2010 addresses some aspects of the issue so efforts are certainly being made at a more macro level to curb actions tantamount to cyber bullying. To date, there has been at least one conviction in Jamaica which bears elements of cyber bullying.

In that situation, a 30-year-old man was the mastermind behind a website that for months, displayed pornographic photographs and videos of individuals in a bid to obtain money from the victims, in exchange for removing their content.

But what happens when this is localised and perpetuated in our schools?

We must admit that cyber bullying will most likely take place at schools, but little or nothing has been done to protect children from the debilitating effects.

Schools need to work on ‘changing the culture’ in a bid to address cyber bullying among students. As a teacher, staff member, parent or other stakeholder, there are steps that can be taken to combat online bullying.

Here are a few:

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Support: Provide support and some sort of reassurance to the student being bullied. Encourage a system of openness and prompt reporting bolster by telling them that they did the right thing by coming forward. Encourage the child to seek support from parents, the school counsellor, principal or teachers if an issue ever arises. Ensure they that know support is available and inform them about how to access it.

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Evidence: In order to assist with future investigations, help with safeguarding the relevant pieces of evidence. One way to do this is to take screenshots or printing Web Pages that contain the offensive content. Resist the temptation to delete phone messages and other important content. The sad fact is that the intended victim may vary and tend to be progressive. The perpetrator might ‘bully’ one person then move on to another, which forms an intricately dangerous cycle.

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Investigation: Claims related to cyber bullying must be investigated fully. If the perpetrator is known, ask them to remove offending remarks or posts. All records should be kept as part of the investigation and, if need be form the basis of disciplinary action. Depending on the severity of the actions, they might possibly venture into the realm of criminal activity.

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Inform: Constant guidance and information is crucial. The child could benefit from advice on how to prevent this from happening again. The school should also promote the sharing of information and new threats as well as how to handle such situations including the risk and damage. Frequent sensitisation sessions on best practices are one way of achieving this. Some best practices include periodically changing passwords and, if your account has been hacked, making your social media profile private, blocking the perpetrator’s profile, or reporting abuse online.

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No Retaliation: As part of being a responsible citizen, the school and other stakeholders should promote ‘responsible action’. This will promote a culture where the teen does not feel the need to retaliate or reply to the messages, which, often times, exacerbates the situation.

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Privacy: The educational initiative and constant reminder will encourage the teen to keep personal information private, especially on the internet. Children will inadvertently publish personal information on the internet such as their addresses and contact information among other, which unscrupulous people will quickly take advantage of.

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Report: Reports regarding abuse can be made on the respective social networking sites or even to mobile phone service providers. Some websites handle reports of abuse quickly and also have internal policies activated to protect users.

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Guidelines: Government, schools and other stakeholders will need to develop policy documents as reference. These include clearly articulated Acceptable Use Policies (AUPs), anti-bullying policies, and behaviour and disciplinary polices. These should be shared with students and parents in a bid to establish parameters within which to operate and the consequences if the guidelines are circumvented.

The issue has not resulted in any significant ills thus far but it ought not to be ignored. We need to work together as Government, citizens and NGOs to mitigate this very real and debilitating issue.

Hodine O Williams is an attorney-at-law and legal officer at the Ministry of National Security, Jamaica. Andrae Campbell is an ICT Consultant based in Canada and holds degrees in IT and law and is currently reading for a MSc in Cybersecurity. Contact them at: hodine.williams@gmail.com