Internet Trolling...should it be a criminal offence

[mizdarby]

Can we just clear this up? this law will not make trolling a criminal offence, all it does is let victims know the identity of the troll so they can take civil action. If you can't afford to take civil action or the troll has nothing worth suing for then whole thing is a little pointless, unless of course you decide to take a more direct course of action against the troll in which case you'll find yourself in jail. For your average Joe this law is worthless, it will only benefit the wealthy who already abuse our laws to silence people.

Good valid points.

Perhaps it's because I'm a blonde, that I don't fully appreciate the difference between criminality and civil cases. I would take the view, that should the law pass, and should I suffer a trolling campaign, then I could get the id of the troller, go to court and get some recompense, and though it would be a civil case, to myself it would feel like justice for actions against me, that felt like a criminal attack. So in respect to the proposed policies, it would be a civil matter, although personally in the more extreme cases, I would like the law to go further into the actual realm of criminality.

For the average Joe, it would initially be worthless, but I suspect that new companies of 'legal experts' will spring up (like they did when ppi became an issue), eager to take up this new class of civil actions, on the usual no win no fee basis.

[Sync182]

Isn't that kind of what pranks are? Doing things that would be considered bad and possibly embarrass or hurt someone for your enjoyment?

 

Should pranks be illegal?

Some pranks are illegal, some others just mean a civil suit, exactly because they hurt someone or cause damage to property. Blowing up mailboxes for example.

What about verbal pranks?

 

It's really, really simple (too simple for the average troll/idiot/juvenile twit to comprehend, unfortunately):

 

If you wouldn't like it done to you, don't do it to someone else.

 

I've absolutely no intention of getting into the religious implications of this next statement...but wasn't it Christ's second Great Commandment that said "Love thy neighbour as thyself"?

Edited August 4, 2012 by Sync182

[JimboUK]

Can we just clear this up? this law will not make trolling a criminal offence, all it does is let victims know the identity of the troll so they can take civil action. If you can't afford to take civil action or the troll has nothing worth suing for then whole thing is a little pointless, unless of course you decide to take a more direct course of action against the troll in which case you'll find yourself in jail. For your average Joe this law is worthless, it will only benefit the wealthy who already abuse our laws to silence people.

Good valid points.

Perhaps it's because I'm a blonde, that I don't fully appreciate the difference between criminality and civil cases. I would take the view, that should the law pass, and should I suffer a trolling campaign, then I could get the id of the troller, go to court and get some recompense, and though it would be a civil case, to myself it would feel like justice for actions against me, that felt like a criminal attack. So in respect to the proposed policies, it would be a civil matter, although personally in the more extreme cases, I would like the law to go further into the actual realm of criminality.

For the average Joe, it would initially be worthless, but I suspect that new companies of 'legal experts' will spring up (like they did when ppi became an issue), eager to take up this new class of civil actions, on the usual no win no fee basis.

 

I imagine those "legal experts" will soon vanish when they find the troll is a child or teenager with no money or is someone on benefits. Anyway a lot of these trolls are minors, are we going to start suing children? the parents won't be held responsible, they never are. I think a more sensible approach would be implementing a system that removes the internet connection of the worst offenders, if a parent faces losing their internet over the actions of their children then they're far more likely to supervise their children.

[ginnyfizz]

I see people trying to make a distinction between trolling and harassment. Sometimes there is no distinction. A persistent trolling campaign, such as the one I was the victim of, can cross the line into both defamation and intimidation.

I see people trying to equate an offensive post on the internet and harassment. Is there always no distinction? constructing your argument around a troll who is either mentally disturbed or crosses the boundaries into harassing and threatening behaviour is essentially a straw man. These conditions are probably not met in 99% of offensive posts on the internet.

 

No, you don't. The key word in what I posted was "Sometimes". I quite clearly didn't say "always", and nor did I say that the majority of offensive posts on the internet fall into the category of harassment and threatening behaviour. All along in this thread, I've been pretty clear on the distinction between merely rude/offensive and truly menacing, that I do not feel a new law is necessary although access to lawyers might need to be made easier for those who do have trolls that cross into the harassment category. So there really wasn't any need to wallop me over the head with the logical fallacies.

[Syco21]

Nope...

 

You're still free to say something I don't like, but that does not protect you from me disliking you for it, pressing charges, assuming suspicion, writing you off as a loon, rebutting with something you don't like, or punching your face in (freedom of expression) (assault carries its own separate consequences which are sometimes totally worth it).

You're confusing ability with right. Just because someone has the ability to do something, doesn't mean they have a right to do it. Sure I have the ability to knock on my neighbor's door and shoot them in the face, but I do not have the right. That is not my freedom of expression, no matter how much I may scream that I am merely expressing my dislike for them.

 

Likewise, you do not have a right to attack me. That is why it is illegal. When something is illegal, the law is stating you do not have a right to do that.

 

As for forcing someone to drop off the face of the earth through constant harassment, crime or not, it doesn't get enforced and I know more than a few people who have had to sever all ties for awhile because of some a**hole/*censored* in their life. It can't really be enforced without knowing who the actual party is who is doing the harassment, which is not always easy.

So your answer to laws that go unenforced is to make more things illegal? If the laws on the book aren't already enforced, what makes you think new ones will be? If laws aren't enforced, then lobby for them to be enforced. If the laws are unenforceable because it's too hard to track down the perpetrator, new laws aren't going to change that.

 

I have said that I feel the existing law is enough to cover the serious cases. The only problem is access to the law for victims of serious trolling, which costs money. In the UK, lawyers are not so willing to take cases on a contingency fee basis as they are in the USA. It was only made legal for UK lawyers to take cases on this basis relatively recently. So a lot of victims might simply not be able to afford to take civil actions. Where the trolling constitutes a criminal offence, then of course you have to persuade the police and the CPS to take action, and then you might potentially be into an extradition situation. Now whereas the USA for example will demand extradition of British citizens for relatively silly copyright infringement allegations, they are not quite so ready to agree to British extradition requests for their citizens. All countries can get a bit arsey about extraditing, except dear old Britain who agree to anything.

New laws will not change that. The US government only extradites pirates because big businesses demand it. It sucks, but if you ain't got money, the government isn't too keen on helping you.

[marharth]

You can't really compare real life pranks to online trolling. Real life pranks are usually easier to track down in those cases where harm or distress is the result of the prank. If someone is calling your phone repeatedly to harass you, you can just ignore them and they will lose interest or escalate to a point where a law is broken and charges are pressed.

 

Relatively few people would go through the trouble of buying a pre-paid cellphone to make excessive prank calls, and just throw the phone away before anyone can find out who it is... Since all of this costs something to that person. And even then, in extreme cases, a cellphone can be tracked down to a place of purchase by the serial number, locations can be tracked down based on activation logs, from a store and time of sale you can get a photo of the person from store security, potentially a credit card number if used for the purchase, and potentially a license plate or make/model from the parking lot cameras. There is relatively little you can do in a modern, urban area that does not leave some evidence. The only question is if it is worth the trouble to find that person.

 

Trolling however usually cannot be tracked down, and in some cases it can be very difficult to prevent. Trolling has no real cost to hide your identity since it is relatively easy to use a proxy and setup any number of accounts with phoney credentials. If the person has any connection to a hacking group, they pretty much have to screw up badly, or get someone else to hack them to get caught.

People can just use a pay phone or something similar. People who actually do prank calls commonly don't use private phones.

 

I will go back to what I said before. If you don't want people messing with you ignore them. If its on facebook make it only viewable to friends. If its on instant messengers block them. Don't give out private information to random people if you don't want them contacting you. It is very rare that people NEED to have their information posted online.

 

Making online harassment illegal won't just get rid of the large cases, it will also get rid of extremely minor things too. Letting people know who you are just because they don't like you is a terrible idea. I do not think the people making the law can properly draw the line.

Edited August 5, 2012 by marharth

[Vagrant0]

People can just use a pay phone or something similar.

Pay phones? What are those? Oh... you mean those mostly extinct things that they used to have in subway stations and airports which are now almost certainly all watched by one or two cameras? There are no more payphones on street corners, or outside places of business. As each pay phone has a unique number tied to a specific location, and everyone has video surveillance these days, that's pretty much a sure way to leave a trail. Granted that it is unlikely for anyone to be bothered enough to track you down, it isn't usually a viable method of harassing someone since there are so few pay phones around any more. And even then, you're dropping about a $0.50 in change every time, and usually wasting it since everyone screens their calls these days due to the constant telemarketers and campaign calls. There are cheaper and easier methods these days to get your misanthropic fun.

 

@Syco21

I think you are misunderstanding... well everything. The reason why it cannot currently be enforced is that people are able to hide behind their ISP and remain anonymous. The reason why it cannot be enforced is because both parties may not be in the same country or one of them may be a minor, or other similar situation which makes legal prosecution difficult. The bill we are discussing does NOT make trolling illegal. All it does is add in a provision so that victims have a legal recourse towards requesting the identity of an individual for the purposes of a civil suit, or to provide enough evidence to that ISP to discontinue service to that customer. And this sort of thing would likely only occur in some of the more extreme situations.

 

Freedom of speech does not apply anywhere in this whole thing.

[marharth]

People can just use a pay phone or something similar.

Pay phones? What are those? Oh... you mean those mostly extinct things that they used to have in subway stations and airports which are now almost certainly all watched by one or two cameras? There are no more payphones on street corners, or outside places of business. As each pay phone has a unique number tied to a specific location, and everyone has video surveillance these days, that's pretty much a sure way to leave a trail. Granted that it is unlikely for anyone to be bothered enough to track you down, it isn't usually a viable method of harassing someone since there are so few pay phones around any more. And even then, you're dropping about a $0.50 in change every time, and usually wasting it since everyone screens their calls these days due to the constant telemarketers and campaign calls. There are cheaper and easier methods these days to get your misanthropic fun.

There are methods of using computers for calls that can not be traced as well.

 

Still that only addressed one part of my point.

[ginnyfizz]

I have said that I feel the existing law is enough to cover the serious cases. The only problem is access to the law for victims of serious trolling, which costs money. In the UK, lawyers are not so willing to take cases on a contingency fee basis as they are in the USA. It was only made legal for UK lawyers to take cases on this basis relatively recently. So a lot of victims might simply not be able to afford to take civil actions. Where the trolling constitutes a criminal offence, then of course you have to persuade the police and the CPS to take action, and then you might potentially be into an extradition situation. Now whereas the USA for example will demand extradition of British citizens for relatively silly copyright infringement allegations, they are not quite so ready to agree to British extradition requests for their citizens. All countries can get a bit arsey about extraditing, except dear old Britain who agree to anything.

New laws will not change that. The US government only extradites pirates because big businesses demand it. It sucks, but if you ain't got money, the government isn't too keen on helping you.

 

Please, for the Talos knows how many times of asking, I did not say that I was either in favour of new laws or that they would change anything. So why do I keep being quoted as if I am in favour of a change in the law? The only thing I have said is that access to the existing law is a problem for the less well off victim and that something might need to be done to facilitate that.

 

The US requests the extradition of pirates. I would be very surprised if they agreed to any British request to extradite (yes the distinction IS important) a US citizen to the UK for the same crime, nor I suspect would they extradite a troll to the UK even if a clear evidence of a criminal offence had been laid. The seemingly rather one sided extradition treaty has been ruffling quite a few diplomatic feathers of late.

 

Within Europe it could conceivably be different as there is always the (admittedly also open to abuse) European arrest warrant. Julian Assange seems to be managing to evade one so far though...

[kanakosoup]

In my country all you could do is to file a libel case. Of course the suspect must be within the country. There have been reports where someone filed a libel for because of youtube trolling.