Post by cenydd on Aug 8, 2013 11:08:25 GMT
Internet users should boycott "vile" websites that allow cyberbullying in order to avoid more deaths of young people who receive abuse online, the prime minister has said.
David Cameron said website operators must "step up to the plate" to ensure people are protected from online abuse following the death of 14-year-old Hannah Smith, who was found hanged on Friday after being bullied on Ask.fm.
Her father David Smith said those who run the website should face murder or manslaughter charges and called for more regulation of social networking sites.
His comments came as the government was criticised for not doing enough to tackle online abuse directed at children.
www.theguardian.com/society/2013/aug/08/cyberbullying-websites-boycotted-david-cameron
This seems to be becoming a major issue, but to what extant should (or can) it be solved by government actions? There is an obvious issue, I think, with governments getting too directly involved in deciding what it appropriate on websites, but an even more obvious issue of legal jurisdiction. Perhaps it is time, though, for some real action on dealing with cyberbullying (and other such issues) via social media.
On thing that strikes me, as someone who has had to deal with the report button on a forum for some time, is that many of these social netwoking sites just don't seem to have adequate versions of the same thing. Setting up a social media platform and leaving the users to carry on regardless, entirely on their own, isn't enough, in my opinion, and it isn't enough either to take an approach of 'if they do anything really bad the courts will have to deal with it, if they can' either. There needs to be a greater level of support and assistance available to combat serious abuse across such platforms (not to mention issues like 'grooming', of course), and that needs international cooperation between countries to impress on the companies involved that it is necessary, and that if they are going to make massive profits from hosting such a system they also need to fulfil their responsibilities to protect their members by employing sufficient people to be able to react quickly to reports of abuse, bullying, and so on.
Boycotting the sites can help, of course, but it isn't enough - realistically, many teenagers will ignore any such boycott and carry on anyway. There needs to be a wider approach to dealing with the problem than that, I think.