Stalkers will use any form of media and communication to stalk their victims. Here is another breaking news story about another stalker.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — The college student had endured months of online and cell phone harassment from her ex-boyfriend. She ignored the barrage of e-mails, changed her phone number and dismantled online profiles to cut him off.

Then one evening, her cell phone signaled a new text message. It was him again.

“You should keep to yourself and stay away from other people,” the message said, according to the student, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she feared for her safety. Her ex had found her photo online and attached it. – washingtonpost.com

A study of stalking by the U.S. Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics released last month confirmed that stalking by texting has become a pervasive problem.

The report found 23 percent of stalking or harassment victims reported in 2006 that the stalker had used some form of cyberstalking, such as cell phone texting or e-mail, to harass them. It was the agency’s first measure of the emerging practice, said Katrina Baum, one of the study’s authors.

“Technology has become a quick and easy way for stalkers to monitor and harass their victims,” the report said.

- washingtonpost.com

Currently there are only 46 states that have anti-stalking laws which refer to electronic forms of communication, of those, only four of the states use the term “text messaging”. If you are faced with a textual harasser, contact your wireless phone service provider and demand that you not be charged for these unwanted text messages.

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NEW YORK  —  A Long Island teenager is suing Facebook and four former high school classmates for allegedly bullying her in a private forum on the social networking site.

Denise Finkel, now a student at the University of Albany, filed suit in Manhattan for $3 million.

She’s claiming the former Oceanside High School classmates created a password protected Facebook group to — quote — “…hold the plaintiff up to public hatred, ridicule and disgrace.” – Fox News

Perhaps the teenager should be confronting the former high school classmates and holding them accountable for the harassment instead of Facebook about this issue. Although social networks such as Facebook make it a lot easier to bully others, especially anonymously and in groups…

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Facebook has been the victim of five different security problems in the past week, says Trend Micro.

According to the security firm, four hoax applications have become available on the social network along with a new variation of the Koobface virus, which was first detected at the end of last year, and directs users to a fake YouTube page where they are encouraged to install malware. – PC World

Facebook applications were never meant to be installed. If you are not sure what the application does exactly and receive an invite from an unknown person, don’t install the application to your profile! Most applications are useless, and keep in mind that anyone can create an application. That includes criminals and stalkers who have a lot more time on their hands to do terrible things like this.

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In addition to being stalked online, cyber stalkers can physically stalk you as well as through other channels such as cell phones and text messaging. A new feature called TrapCall, will allow for all numbers to be seen before you decide to take the call or not. You can even block numbers! This will be a great feature to look into as you try to minimize all traces of the unwanted stalking. No more harassing emails – TrapCall.com

Read more about this at Wired.com

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Individuals can be subject to cyberstalking… but so can small business and corporations. A new report from the Federation of Small Businesses released recently that over 50% of small business were victims of cyber crimes or fraud.

The Federation of Small Businesses released a report that shows over 50% of small businesses fell prey to fraud or cyber crime within the last 12 months. The report also revealed that 37% encountered phishing emails, 15% were victims to card-not-present fraud and 15% were attacked by viruses and hackers’ break-in.

But what is notable with the report is that 1/3 of businesses do not report fraud or online crime to the police or banks on the grounds that they ‘believe that it would not achieve anything’. Over half of the polled said they would like to know more about how and where to report these types of crime with 44% stated they want a specifically named contact in their local police force responsible for tackling fraud and online crime.

85% expressed their interest in creating a special reporting center in England and Scotland so that they would be able to report incidents to this body. The report shows that fraud with a financial impact cost small businesses between £500 and £5,000, while the average cost across the sector is £768 a year. – Ecommerce Journal

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A new state law in Maryland could pass to expand cyber harassment to social networks, currently it is limited to email only. It is important to know that, cyber harassment already exists in social networks and acoss all different types of media outlets including cell phones. This law ought to pass and other states should follow suit in order to prevent cyberstalkers from doing more harm.

The current law says you can be charged with a misdemeanor and sentenced to up to one year in prison or fined $500.

Last summer, a 13-year-old Maryland girl became the target of former friends who put up a fake MySpace page depicting her as a crazy, drunken, promiscuous girl.

Kids can be cruel, and some parents say it’s time for Maryland law to address cyber bullying.

Police protection from cyber harassment in Maryland is limited to e-mail.

Under House bill 580, that protection would expand to any electronic communication, including social networking sites and online postings. - wtop.com

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Even though you may be the victim of a cyberstalking crime, you may not want to believe it. Sometimes you might even think this person who is harassing you will stop. But they won’t, and if they do, most likely they will have found a new victim to harass. It is important to recognize what cyberstalking is, and to prevent it from happening to you. Here is another great resource to learn more about cyberstalkers and what they are capable of.

Cyberharassment is harassment over the Internet. This crime can take many forms, ranging from persistent instant messages and emails to outright Internet attacks or defamations. This type of crime is often driven by the perpetrators desire to teach the victim a lesson or embarrass him or her. The perpetrator may post threatening or harmful messages on forums, send threatening emails, or put up Internet pages with false information about the victim. They may sign the victim up for pornography sites, use their email information to post incriminating or embarrassing information, and other such behavior. – Internet Safety for Kids

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18 U.S.C. 875 (c) – under this law it is a crime to transmit any type of communication in interstate or foreign commerce that contains a threat to injure another person. Because this law contains any communication the Internet and other electronic communication devices are covered under this law, but only if there is an actual threat to harm somebody. This law does not cover harassment or the posting of messages on bulletin boards, etc. But if somebody is convicted of this crime they can face up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
47 U.S.C. 223 – under this law it is a crime to use a telephone or telecommunications device to annoy, harass, or threaten any person at the called number. But in order for this law to be effective the person doing the harassment has to reveal his or her name, so it would not cover cases where the cyberstalker harasses or annoys another person by posting messages on bulletin boards or encouraging others to harass the person. If convicted under this law the cyberstalker only faces a misdemeanor charge which is punishable by not more than two years in prison.

Interstate Stalking Act – this was signed into law by President Clinton in 1996 and made it a crime for any person to travel across state lines with the intent to injure or harass another person and in the course thereof places that person or their family in a reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury. This law is covered under 18 U.S.C. 2261A. This law is usually not applied to cyberstalking cases because the person actually has to physically travel across state lines to be prosecuted.

18 U.S.C. 2425 – this law makes it a federal crime to use any means of interstate or foreign commerce (phones, Internet, etc) to knowingly communicate with a minor with the intention to solicit or entice the child into unlawful sexual activity. This law does not cover harassing phone calls to minors unless there is the intent to solicit or entice the child into illicit sexual activities.

Read more at The Legal Side of Online Stalking and Harassment.

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Here is another great resource to help you deal with cyberstalkers:

At some time in our lives we have probably received unwanted emails or we have gotten into a brief argument with somebody online; depending on whom you are it may have happened more than once. But the problem occurs when this type of behavior continues. If you are getting unwanted email from the same person day in and day out or somebody is following you around to different chat rooms, chances are you are a victim of online stalking and harassment. Many people think that if they ignore the behavior than the person will go away; in some cases this is true, but what happens when that person doesn’t stop? What are you going to do now? – Surfnetkids.com

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Time recently wrote an interesting article explaining why old people would actually benefit more from using facebook than young adults and college students. Ironically, it was built for college students! After reading this, I thought to myself, do we really need facebook to help us connect with people?

Facebook is five. Maybe you didn’t get it in your news feed, but it was in February 2004 that Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg, along with some classmates, launched the social network that ate the world. Did he realize back then in his dorm that he was witnessing merely the larval stage of his creation? For what began with college students has found its fullest, richest expression with us, the middle-aged. Here are 10 reasons Facebook is for old fogies. – TIME

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