Cyber – Techniques

Cyberstalking: Dangers on the Information Superhighway
By Trudy M. Gregorie, Director of Training
National Center for Victims of Crime, 2001

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 mail bombs (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.

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.

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.