Young victims seeking help over online bullying doubles
5,000 a year getting advice from Childline Charity calls for tough laws on social media
THE number of youngsters gett cyber-bullying has doubled over five years.
Shock figures from Childline show that the free 24-hour service helped 5,103 youngsters in the past year – 12% up on the year before and double that of 2012.
The cyber-bullying pages on its website have also been viewed 73,000 times over the past 12 months.
Dame Esther Rantzen, founder and president of Childline, said: “Young people these days rely upon their mobile phones and social media to keep in touch with friends but, inevitably, that makes it easier for bullies to pursue their victims relentlessly.”
The shock increase in cyber-bullying comes as Childline says one in four young people cannot access its service because of a lack of resources.
The NSPCC and Mirror Christmas campaign, Light Up Christmas for Children, is raising money to help Childline answer every call.
The bullying figures, released at the start of Anti-Bullying Week, revealed children as young as nine told the service they were being targeted online, with girls and 12 to 15-year-olds receiving the most counselling sessions.
Many victims had name-calling and death threats posted on their social media profiles and some had been blackmailed, with threats to show certain photos or videos.
Some victims had been left feeling suicidal or wanting to self-harm. One boy told counsellors: “People call me fat and ugly. I can’t block them because they’ll bully me more at school. I just feel like giving up. I’ve been self-harming to cope but I want to stop feeling this way.”
Dame Esther added: “Every year we lose precious young lives because bullying has made children and teenagers feel that life is not worth living.
“Childline wants to remind young people they are not alone.”
The NSPCC is calling on the Government to draw up rules enshrined in law to require all social media sites to protect children from cyber-bullying, including alerts to moderators.
They also want strict privacy settings by default, easy-to-follow reporting processes and specially trained child safety moderators.
It comes as Prince William has been working with tech giants for 18 months on cyber-bullying.
We lose precious lives because bullying has made children feel life isn’t worth living DAME ESTHER RANTZEN FOUNDER OF THE CHILDLINE CHARITY