CHENNAI: K scrolled through a series of her pictures on Facebook. Only, it wasn’t her profile. Her friend had called her to ask her if she’d created a new profile with a different name. But she hadn’t.
Three years ago, she spotted a fake profile, with her pictures, but a different name, doing rounds on social media. Photos from her real Facebook account was used with captions she’ll never pair. The profile was public and open for everyone to comment. She was shocked, confused and anguished, all at once, as she read through the obscene comments following her pictures.
She stared at a picture of herself in a red saree. It was one of her close friend’s wedding. Little did she expect that this picture of hers would warrant comments of sexual intent. Absolute strangers were spelling out their fantasies, prefixing or suffixing it with synonyms of either s**t or sweetheart.
The then 18-year-old K, was a victim of cyber-harassment. Three years, a police complaint (in 2016), attempts at ethical hacking by her friends and a dozen fake profiles after, newer ones still crop up periodically. “A couple of friends and I had reported the account. By the time the police investigations picked up, Facebook had deleted the account and the police couldn’t find the abuser’s IP address,” said K.
The legal exercise went in vain.
She then turned to a few ethical hackers among her friends. “The person had created the Facebook with email ID that read something like p***y.***@gmail.com. My friends were amateur and found it hard to hack,” she said. She did, what she could in her best capacity. Every time she found a new profile, she’d duly report it until Facebook blocked the account. A day or two later, a new one came up.
Despite resetting her privacy settings to a “fully safe mode”, the cyber-abuser used her old pictures or pictures from her friend’s instagram account. The bully probably knew her personally. “I don’t remember pissing anyone off to the point they would like to shame me. If I had to narrow it down to options, it would be every person I knew from during college years,” rued K adding that she soon ran out of options.
It has been three years since and newer profiles, even a public “fan-club” page has been created. A quick peek into the various profiles commenting beneath her picture revealed that many of them were fake themselves. Many accounts had double names (for example: Kumar Kumar, Gokul Gokul, Nivedita Nivz).
Obscene profiles
A more elaborate search into the different profiles associated with it, opened a can of worms: scores of obscene fake profiles and morphed naked pictures of actresses, with links to twitter and blogs where one can find more “revenge porn” against women. When Express contacted two of these actresses, they seemed unaware of these profiles.
The only constructive way to deal with these profiles is to register a police complaint and to pursue it with dedication, suggests Naavi Vijayashankar, a cyber law expert. “In most cases, the victims will know the abuser personally. Using police’s help to track the location could help trace the person,” he said. He however added that many lose patience when the complaint doesn’t yield immediate result.
“The vicim should urge police to contact Facebook asking its management to divulge the IP address for the last 100 log-ins. Sometimes, the IP address of the log-in and one of the profiles that commented on such profiles may match,” he said.
Uphill task
A police official from the cyber-crime cell in Chennai said that the police are often left at the mercy of Facebook and other multi-national companies for details. “Victims report these accounts before registering a complaint and it’s difficult to summon the IP address of the deleted profiles,” the official said, adding that if the IP is detected overseas, the social media company does not divulge any information to police. The official said that tracking abusers on whatsapp or mobile devices is relatively easier, as telecom networks are bound by Indian laws.
According to the official, it’s often too late before victims become aware of how their social media accounts can be exploited.
In a move to “empower” women about their cyber rights and increase their knowledge on reporting crimes, the National Commission for Women (NCW) in collaboration with Cyber Peace Foundation has launched a digital literacy programme.
The programme for women will begin with a one-year long pilot phase, that aims to train 60,000 women in universities through interactive sessions. Through these sessions, Facebook will conduct training on safe and responsible practices over the internet and social media. The one-year pilot of Facebook’s digital literacy program will be held in Delhi-NCR, Haryana, Manipur, Maharashtra, Meghalaya, Sikkim, and Tamil Nadu. Facebook couldn’t be contacted for comment.
While prevention of digital harassment could be hard, awareness of digital rights and knowledge on penalty for violating law through cyber harassment, can go a long way in reducing in crimes, Vineet Kumar, founder of Cyber Peace Foundation, opined.