Hyderabad: A recent survey has found that one out of two school-going children were victims of cyber stalking in the country. The survey — by Uninor — also found that 30 per cent of children in the country who regularly accessed the Internet had experienced some kind of cyber harm including cyber stalking, cyber bullying, hacking and defamation.
The survey covered nearly 10,500 children in 29 schools. It also concluded that only 34 per cent of children spoke to their parents about their online activities.
Twenty three per cent of boys and 58 per cent girls have faced cyber stalking while surfing the Net for their school projects and on social media sites. Among them only 31 per cent have blocked the websites where they were targeted, while the rest continue to visit them.
Uninor expects 10 crore children in the country to be onlin active by 2017.
Another survey done by Symantec Norton, a renowned anti-virus company, covering 1,005 smartphone users in the age group of 13-16, revealed that 30 per cent of 22 per cent children faced cyber stalking, 26 per cent cyber bullying, 24 per cent revenge porn and 12 per cent faced sweetheart scams.
A few cases have been registered with the Hyderabad, Cyberabad police related to cyber stalking and cyber offences against school children. Last year, the Cyberabad Cybercrime wing, under the supervision of ACP Jayaram, apprehended a criminal who had been trapping school girls stating that he had their nude pictures and would extort money from them.
Based on a complaint filed by the mother of a girl, police had apprehended the criminal. Hyderabad CCS police has also cracked down on a few cyber criminals for cyber stalking school children. Centre for Cyber Victim Counseling (CCVC) and cyber crime experts have been alerting parents to keep an eye on the activities of their children while surfing the Internet.
The survey has also shown about 84 per cent parents thought their children were doing well and there were no possibilities of threats to them from cyberspace.
