Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Cyberstalking... Not a Victimless Crime.

Cyberstalking is the use of the Internet or other electronic means to stalk or harass an individual, a group of individuals, or an organization.[1] It may include the making of false accusations or statements of fact (as in defamation), monitoring, making threats, identity theft, damage to data or equipment, the solicitation of minors for sex, or gathering information that may be used to harass. The definition of "harassment" must meet the criterion that a reasonable person, in possession of the same information, would regard it as sufficient to cause another reasonable person distress.[2] Cyberstalking is different from spatial or offline stalking in that it occurs through the use of electronic communications technology such as the internet. However, it sometimes leads to it, or is accompanied by it.[3] Both are criminal offenses.[4] Cyberstalking shares important characteristics with offline stalking; many stalkers – online or off – are motivated by a desire to control their victims.[5]
A cyberstalker may be an online stranger or a person whom the target knows. A cyberstalker may be anonymous and may solicit involvement of other people online who do not even know the target.
Cyberstalking is a criminal offense that comes into play under state anti-stalking laws, slander laws, and harassment laws. A cyberstalking conviction can result in a restraining order, probation, or even criminal penalties against the assailant, including jail.

Definitions

Stalking is a continuous process, consisting of a series of actions, each of which may be entirely legal in itself. Technology ethics professor Lambèr Royakkers writes that:
Stalking is a form of mental assault, in which the perpetrator repeatedly, unwantedly, and disruptively breaks into the life-world of the victim, with whom he has no relationship (or no longer has), with motives that are directly or indirectly traceable to the affective sphere. Moreover, the separated acts that make up the intrusion cannot by themselves cause the mental abuse, but do taken together (cumulative effect).[6]
CyberAngels has written about how to identify cyberstalking:
When identifying cyberstalking "in the field," and particularly when considering whether to report it to any kind of legal authority, the following features or combination of features can be considered to characterize a true stalking situation: malice, premeditation, repetition, distress, obsession, vendetta, no legitimate purpose, personally directed, disregarded warnings to stop, harassment, and threats.[7]
A number of key factors have been identified:
  • False accusations. Many cyberstalkers try to damage the reputation of their victim and turn other people against them. They post false information about them on websites. They may set up their own websites, blogs or user pages for this purpose. They post allegations about the victim to newsgroups, chat rooms, or other sites that allow public contributions such as Wikipedia or Amazon.com.[8]
  • Attempts to gather information about the victim. Cyberstalkers may approach their victim's friends, family, and work colleagues to obtain personal information. They may advertise for information on the Internet, or hire a private detective.[9]
  • Monitoring their target's online activities and attempting to trace their IP address in an effort to gather more information about their victims. [10]
  • Encouraging others to harass the victim. Many cyberstalkers try to involve third parties in the harassment. They may claim the victim has harmed the stalker or his/her family in some way, or may post the victim's name and telephone number in order to encourage others to join the pursuit.
  • False victimization. The cyberstalker will claim that the victim is harassing him/her. Bocij writes that this phenomenon has been noted in a number of well-known cases.
  • Attacks on data and equipment. They may try to damage the victim's computer by sending viruses.
  • Ordering goods and services. They order items or subscribe to magazines in the victim's name. These often involve subscriptions to pornography or ordering sex toys then having them delivered to the victim's workplace.
  • Arranging to meet. Young people face a particularly high risk of having cyberstalkers try to set up meetings between them.[11]
Cyberstalking is a form of cyberbullying.

Motives

Mental profiling of digital criminals has identified factors that motivate stalkers as: envy; pathological obsession (professional or sexual); unemployment or failure with own job or life; intention to intimidate and cause others to feel inferior; the stalker is delusional and believes he/she "knows" the target; the stalker wants to instill fear in a person to justify his/her status; belief they can get away with it (anonymity); intimidation for financial advantage or business competition; revenge over perceived or imagined rejection.[12][13]

Types

Of women

Harassment and stalking of women online is common, and can include rape threats, and other threats of violence, as well as the posting of women's personal information. It is blamed for limiting victims' activities online or driving them offline entirely, thereby impeding their participation in online life and undermining their autonomy, dignity, identity, and opportunities.[14]

Of intimate partners

Cyberstalking of intimate partners is the online harassment of a current or former romantic partner. It is a form of domestic violence, and experts say its purpose is to control the victim in order to encourage social isolation and create dependency. Harassers may send repeated insulting or threatening e-mails to their victims, monitor or disrupt their victims' e-mail use, and use the victim's account to send e-mails to others posing as the victim or to purchase goods or services the victim does not want. They may also use the internet to research and compile personal information about the victim, to use in order to harass him or her.[15]

Of celebrities and public persons

Profiling of stalkers shows that almost always they stalk someone they know or, via delusion, think they know, as is the case with stalkers of celebrities or public persons in which the stalkers feel they know the celebrity even though the celebrity does not know them.[16] As part of the risk they take for being in the public eye, celebrities and public figures are often targets of lies or made-up stories in tabloids as well as by stalkers, some even seeming to be fans. In one noted case in 2011, actress Patricia Arquette quit Facebook after alleged cyberstalking. In her last post, Arquette explained that her security guys chewed her out and warned her Facebook friends to never accept friend requests from people they do not actually know. Arquette stressed the importance of differentiating that just because people were on her page or seemed to be friends or fans did not really mean they were safe. "I'm going to say it again because it is important", the actress wrote about persons on her page, "it doesn't mean they are safe". The media issued a statement that Arquette planned to communicate with fans exclusively through her Twitter account in the future.[17]

By anonymous online mobs

Web 2.0 technologies have enabled online groups of anonymous people to self-organize to target individuals with online defamation, threats of violence and technology-based attacks. These include publishing lies and doctored photographs, threats of rape and other violence, posting sensitive personal information about victims, e-mailing damaging statements about victims to their employers, and manipulating search engines to make damaging material about the victim more prominent. Victims are often women and minorities.[citation needed] They frequently respond by adopting pseudonyms or going offline entirely.[18] A notable example of online mob harassment was the experience of American software developer and blogger Kathy Sierra. In 2007 a group of anonymous individuals attacked Sierra, threatening her with rape and strangulation, publishing her home address and Social Security number, and posting doctored photographs of her. Frightened, Sierra cancelled her speaking engagements and shut down her blog, writing “I will never feel the same. I will never be the same.”[18]
Experts attribute the destructive nature of anonymous online mobs to group dynamics, saying that groups with homogeneous views tend to become more extreme as members reinforce each other's beliefs, they fail to see themselves as individuals, so they lose a sense of personal responsibility for their destructive acts, they dehumanize their victims, which makes them more willing to behave destructively, and they become more aggressive when they believe they are supported by authority figures. Internet service providers and website owners are sometimes blamed for not speaking out against this type of harassment.[18]

Corporate cyberstalking

Corporate cyberstalking is when a company harasses an individual online, or an individual or group of individuals harasses an organization.[19] Motives for corporate cyberstalking are ideological, or include a desire for financial gain or revenge.[20]

Perpetrators

Profile

Preliminary work by Leroy McFarlane and Paul Bocij has identified four types of cyberstalkers: the vindictive cyberstalkers noted for the ferocity of their attacks; the composed cyberstalker whose motive is to annoy; the intimate cyberstalker who attempts to form a relationship with the victim but turns on them if rebuffed; and collective cyberstalkers, groups with a motive.[21] According to Antonio Chacón Medina, author of Una nueva cara de Internet, El acoso ("A new face of the Internet: stalking"), the general profile of the harasser is cold, with little or no respect for others. The stalker is a predator who can wait patiently until vulnerable victims appear, such as women or children, or may enjoy pursuing a particular person, whether personally familiar to them or unknown. The harasser enjoys and demonstrates their power to pursue and psychologically damage the victim.[22]

Behaviors

Cyberstalkers find their victims by using search engines, online forums, bulletin and discussion boards, chat rooms, and more recently, through social networking sites,[23] such as MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, Friendster, Twitter, and Indymedia, a media outlet known for self-publishing. They may engage in live chat harassment or flaming or they may send electronic viruses and unsolicited e-mails.[24] Cyberstalkers may research individuals to feed their obsessions and curiosity. Conversely, the acts of cyberstalkers may become more intense, such as repeatedly instant messaging their targets.[25]
More commonly they will post defamatory or derogatory statements about their stalking target on web pages, message boards, and in guest books designed to get a reaction or response from their victim, thereby initiating contact.[24] In some cases, they have been known to create fake blogs in the name of the victim containing defamatory or pornographic content.
When prosecuted, many stalkers have unsuccessfully attempted to justify their behavior based on their use of public forums, as opposed to direct contact. Once they get a reaction from the victim, they will typically attempt to track or follow the victim's internet activity. Classic cyberstalking behavior includes the tracing of the victim's IP address in an attempt to verify their home or place of employment.[24]
Some cyberstalking situations do evolve into physical stalking, and a victim may experience abusive and excessive phone calls, vandalism, threatening or obscene mail, trespassing, and physical assault.[24] Moreover, many physical stalkers will use cyberstalking as another method of harassing their victims.[26][27]
A 2007 study led by Paige Padgett from the University of Texas Health Science Center found that there was a false degree of safety assumed by women looking for love online.[28][29]

Cyberstalking legislation

United States

The current US Federal Anti-Cyber-Stalking law is found at 47 U.S.C. § 223.[30]
The first U.S. cyberstalking law went into effect in 1999 in California. Other states include prohibition against cyberstalking in their harassment or stalking legislation. In Florida, HB 479 was introduced in 2003 to ban cyberstalking. This was signed into law on October 2003. [31]
While some laws only address online harassment of children, there are laws that protect adult cyberstalking victims. While some sites specialize in laws that protect victims age 18 and under, current and pending cyberstalking-related United States federal and state laws offer help to victims of all ages.[32]
Some states in the U.S. have begun to address the issue of cyberstalking:

  • A few states have both stalking and harassment statutes that criminalize threatening and unwanted electronic communications.
  • Other states have laws other than harassment or anti-stalking statutes that prohibit misuse of computer communications and e-mail, while others have passed laws containing broad language that can be interpreted to include cyberstalking behaviors
Cyberstalking has also been addressed in recent U.S. federal law. For example, the Violence Against Women Act, passed in 2000, made cyberstalking a part of the federal interstate stalking statute. Still, there remains a lack of legislation at the federal level to specifically address cyberstalking, leaving the majority of legislative prohibitions against cyberstalking at the state level.[24]
Most stalking laws require that the perpetrator make a credible threat of violence against the victim; others include threats against the victim's immediate family; and still others require the alleged stalker's course of conduct constitute an implied threat. While some conduct involving annoying or menacing behavior might fall short of illegal stalking, such behavior may be a prelude to stalking and violence and should be treated seriously.[41]
Online identity stealth blurs the line on infringement of the rights of would-be victims to identify their perpetrators. There is a debate on how internet use can be traced without infringing on protected civil liberties.

Friday, October 4, 2013

Raw Travel Debuts in 70% of U.S.



 
AIM TV’S “RAW TRAVEL” SET TO DEBUT IN 70% OF THE U.S. THIS WEEKEND
-  New Travel Show Premieres with Aspirations of Shaking Up Sleepy Genre -

NEW YORK, NY:  October 2nd, 2013 - AIM Tell-A-Vision® Group (AIM TV) announced today that their latest production Raw Travel® is set to debut in over 73 cities and almost 78 million homes via broadcast stations this weekend October 5th -6th, 2013.  

The adventure travel series boasts timeslots in key cities including most of the top 10 markets. The show is set to debut in New York (WWOR-My9 Saturday @ 12 Midnight), Los Angeles (KCAL – 9, Saturday @ 6PM), Chicago (WFLD-Fox 32, Sunday @ 12 midnight), Boston (WCVB-ABC 5, Saturday @ 12 Noon), Atlanta (WUPA-CW 69, Saturday @ 5:30PM), San Francisco (KTVU-Fox 2, Sunday @ 11:30PM), Dallas (KXAS NBC 5, Sun @ 12:30 AM) and many more. Viewers can visit
www.RawTravel.tv/wheretowatch for a complete listing of cities, affiliates and time slots.

Raw Travel is an adventure travel & lifestyle series showcasing the rapidly growing wave of socially and environmentally aware, independent travel. The series weaves together themes of eco-tourism, volun-tourism (giving back) with underground music and authentic culture in a way unique to U.S. television.

Executive Producer and host for the ½ hour weekly series is AIM TV Founder Robert G. Rose, an experienced Executive Producer who has overseen over 300 episodes of 1st run programming and traveled to 30+ countries. Rose collaborated with key production members from his previous creations under his “American Latino Syndication” banner, which he sold to Los Angeles based LATV Networks in 2008.

While shooting Raw Travel, Rose & his crew traveled like typical budget travelers (by bus, boat and train) to destinations which offered unique opportunities for authentic cultural, environmentally sustainable, socially aware and life changing experiences. The Raw Travel crew endured earthquakes, stomach sickness, cramped chicken buses and creepy critters for the chance to experience authentic culture, view incredible landscapes and form long lasting friendships. True to the title, the program illustrates the raw and often unglamorous reality of independent travel. The show simultaneously showcases how this type of travel is not only more affordable, but can spur personal growth and fulfillment.

“I’m humbled by the confidence our broadcasting partners have demonstrated with generous time periods in cities all over the U.S. They had plenty of programming options and they chose Raw Travel,” Rose says. “We’re looking forward to showcasing real travel for real people, that doesn’t revolve around games, contests or celebrities. Raw Travel instead celebrates the wonderful and diverse world around us, which thankfully, needs no gimmick to be both entertaining and life affirming,” Rose continues. 

The website www.RawTravel.tv has undergone a complete facelift that allows fans to interact with producers, view bonus clips, get travel tips and help shape the direction for future episodes.  
                                                                   
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ABOUT AIM TELL-A-VISION GROUP
AIM TV is an independent content, production and distribution company founded by media executive and entrepreneur Robert G. Rose. AIM TV aspires to produce and distribute positive, compelling content that reflects its mission of presenting Media That Matters. Visit www.AIMTVGroup.com and www.RawTravel.tv for more information.

Raw Travel Promo 2013-14.. Sure Hope You Dig It