The government is in discussions with the Attorney General in a bid to draft cyber bullying legislation and since there are no specific laws in place to combat the phenomenon.

Speaking to The Malta Independent, the Parliamentary Secretary for Justice Owen Bonici said: “(The) government is taking this issue very seriously and I, personally, am currently consulting the AG on how to better the legislation and regulations”.

In detailed comments following questions on the subject, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner said that notwithstanding the success of ongoing projects, education about internet safety, including cyber-bullying, needs to be mainstreamed in the country’s educational curriculum for the primary and secondary levels.

“It is very encouraging to note that the ‘National Curriculum Framework for all 2012’ makes clear reference to the need for children to “explore social and ethical dimensions of digital technologies and learn to practice etiquette and online safety measures”. One therefore looks forward to the implementation of this key element within the new national curriculum framework,” it said. 

 

MUT President opens Pandora’s Box

 

The developments come in the wake of an opinion piece by MUT President Kevin Bonello and carried by The Malta Independent last week, about the increasing frequency of cyber bullying amongst children. Also last week, the UK press reported how a 14-year-old Leicestershire girl killed herself after being bullied on a social networking site.

Similarly Police in Canada said on Thursday they had made two arrests in the cyberbullying case of 17-year-old Rehtaeh Parsons who died after a photo of her allegedly being sexually assaulted was shared online.

Her death, after she was taken off life support following a suicide attempt in April, led to outcry. Police initially concluded there were no grounds to charge anyone after a year-long investigation. Her mother said a boy took a photo of the alleged assault in 2011 and that her daughter was bullied for months after it went viral.

On Wednesday, this publishing house joined the MUT in an editorial piece calling for action and highlighting that the government needs to embark on a holistic consultation process to find out where we stand, what data we have available, and what plan can be put into place to at least offer counselling and more support for victims. There are some helplines which children can use, but it is clearly not enough.

Posing the question: “Are we prepared?”, in his piece, Mr Bonello points out that since the conception of electronic means of communication, bullying started to take different forms and bullies learnt how to adapt themselves to the new methodologies.  For example, soon after the telephone became a household device the first cases of harassment by phone were reported. 

He argues that the introduction of mobile telephony took bullying a step further, especially in the light that many mobile lines can be bought over the counter without any necessity of proof of identification. At the same time, most children have access to internet and are therefore much more susceptible to abuse than ever before.  It is a known fact that internet gives the ability to abusers and bullies to morph into anonymity and veil themselves behind screens. 

In further comments over the phone this week, Mr Bonello highlighted that the cases published in international media are real and likely to be taking place in Malta, although they are rarely reported. He pointed out that young people meet strangers on online platforms, often used to play games, and these increase the possibility of meeting stalkers or paedophiles.

Although age limits for the use of these are established, like in the case of Facebook, these are rarely observed.

Speaking from personal experience as an MUT official for the past eight years, Mr Bonello has come across cases of children threatening others by means of SMS. Smart phones and social platforms like Facebook, have made this much easier.

Mentioning a recent local teenage suicide case in particular, he said he did not exclude the possibility that cyber bullying may have been involved. However, even due to the fact that suicides are not reported by the media locally, this would be very hard to confirm.

He therefore emphasised the urgent need for anti-cybercrime legislation and the need for specialised personnel to support children and adults in schools and at the work place, when cyber bullying is involved. The Office of the Children’s Commissioner should also have personnel dedicated to traumatised children as a result of bullying.

The Education Ministry agreed that the advent of social media brought with it a new challenge for children and parents – cyber bullying. The use of social media has magnified the problem in this respect yet this issue is a reality that is not only faced in Malta, but everywhere. Educators are always on the alert to detect different forms of bullying within the education institutions and outside, a spokesman for the ministry said.

It added that when it comes to professional help, over the years there has been a consolidated effort in the improvement of guidance and counselling support services for students in their respective schools.

 

 

Children’s Commissioner stresses need for a multi-pronged approach

 

In further remarks to this newspaper, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner stressed that the developments requirea multi-pronged approach, comprising legislation, law enforcement, victim support and education.

This approach must be pursued equally at the national and international levels, given that the internet transcends national boundaries.  The internet is an extraordinarily powerful tool of communication. This means that it is able to immensely amplify and exacerbate the reach and the effect of any communication, be this of a positive or negative content.

Children are particularly vulnerable to negative communication. Hence, any negative communication directed to children through the internet, such as cyber-bullying, can have devastating consequences on the well-being of children, as the tragic case of the British (and Canadian) girl(s) attest. The actual exposure of children to phenomena like cyber-bullying is very high since while children are generally very adept at and fond of using the internet, their inherent immaturity does not always enable them to easily identify and avoid its dangers.  More so, parents are not always able to protect their children from such dangers given that their mastery of this modern means of communication may sometimes be below that possessed by their children.

Education is arguably the most important weapon in the armoury against cyber-bullying. This is owing to the fact that it can prevent cases of cyber-bullying, thus sparing children from experiencing the negative effects of this phenomenon. The primary targets of education-based efforts to fight cyber-bullying are children, who should be sensitized about the phenomenon and taught how to avoid falling victim to it and what to do if this happens. Parents, teachers and other adults who have a caring role in relation to children should also be educated on how they can protect children from cyber-bullying, the office said.

 

Awareness and education

 

Efforts to provide education about cyber-bullying and cyber-crime are currently done through the BeSmartOnline! project. The educational component of this multi-faceted project lies in its helpline (through 179), which offers free advice and follow-up help to those children and carers who have specific or generic concerns about internet safety for children, and in its youth panel whereby children meet to share and discuss their views and experiences of the internet. Educational outreach sessions in schools are also being carried out and during these last two scholastic years various age groups of children have been targeted. In the forthcoming scholastic year, the school campaign, through the BeSmartOnline! project, targeting all Year 6 students, will be focusing on digital citizenship – online rights and responsibilities highlighting mainly respect for self and others. 

Other education outreach sessions are also taken on the initiative of the Cybercrime Unit of the Police Force; Agenzija Appogg, the Office of the Commissioner for Children and Agenzija Zghazagh.  Schools, Community leaders and Youth organisations are urged to contact these entities in order to hold sessions with their students or members. 

Parents and teachers are targeted through national awareness-raising campaigns and outreach sessions that are also conducted within the framework of the BeSmartOnline! project.

Law enforcement in relation to cyber-bullying is another key component in the fight against this phenomenon, in that it stops offenders from inflicting harm on other children. The Police Force set up the aforementioned Cybercrime Unit in order to ensure a more focused and specialised approach to the fight against cyber-crime. Given the borderless nature of the internet, the Unit collaborates with similar entities abroad in order to neutralize acts of cybercrime. There is collaboration also with the providers of social networking sites with the aim of ensuring there are mechanisms incorporated within the sites that allow children to block and/or report acts of cyber-bullying and cyber-crime. However not all sites incorporate such a mechanism. The BeSmartOnline! project also contributes to the identification of cases of cyber-bullying through its hotline, whereby online abuse can be reported by users to a central base from which action is then taken to neutralize or reduce the risks.

Providing and directing child victims of cyber-bullying to psychological support structures is another essential strategy to combat cyber-bullying. Through the BeSmartOnline! project, the remit of the already established national helpline 179 has been extended to cover internet safety matters.

Legislation is ultimately the most fundamental tool against cyber-bullying and cyber-crime in general. Although Malta does not have specific legislation in relation to cyber-bullying, there are specific provisions in the Criminal Code against all acts of bullying, independently of the fact that they are perpetrated by means of the internet.

The Office of the Children’s Commissiner highlighted that in order to sustain the effort that is being made in relation to internet safety for children, there should be a clear commitment to sustain the BeSmartOnline! project independently of the continued availability of EU funds to cover the costs of the project. More importantly, the project needs to be mainstreamed in the country’s policy-making (not only in respect of education) so that internet safety for children can be pursued more widely, deeply and effectively.  The strengthening of our legislation as well as our counselling service will better serve children when they find themselves facing difficult situations while online.