Jane’s villain of the fortnight

Trolls

I’m not talking about the plastic dolls with vertical hair. I’m talking about the cowards who use the internet as weapon and shield, viciously bullying people while hiding their own identities.

Trolls get a laugh and a kick out of their abuse, but it destroys lives. Suicides among victims are depressingly commonplace, the latest being young mum Leanne Morrison, who died on her 23rd birthday in September.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd has pledged to combat trolling with a new national online hate crime hub to offer support to victims and help drive up prosecutions ( www.snipca.com/25918).

But we’ve been here before. In 2012, the Government proposed changes to defamation laws to help unmask trolls. In 2014, it announced trolls would face two years in prison. In 2015, it launched an anti-trolling website. Little has changed. Trolling is a by-product of human nature, aided and abetted by online anonymity – and I fear that makes this war unwinnable.