In Maine news this week after a 14-year-old Rockport boy threatened a 13-year-old girl through social media, there’s been a predictable amount of virulent conversations on social media concerning the teens, their parents, the school, and technology in general.

First, let’s start with the correct definition of what happened. A 14-year-old male allegedly threatened a 13-year-old girl with rape if she did not send nude photographs of herself. He also allegedly alluded that he was watching her, which is typically a hush tactic; i.e., "you tell on me and I'll make it worse for you."

This is more than just a threat on social media. It’s technically a form of what’s known as sexting extortion, or ‘sextortion.’

“Sexting” refers to taking nude photos of oneself and sharing the photo via cellphone. And why do teens do that? Because today, it is considered a form of relationship currency. Click here to read more of the legal dangers of underage consensual sexting.

But this was not consensual. This was extortion, and you’d better believe the police will get involved when something like this happens.

I’m not going to get into the whys with this column — I don’t know the parents or the kids, so I’m not qualified to speak on why it happened.

But, I am going to talk about how this was — and still is — preventable.

Since 2002, through Governor King’s 1:1 laptop initiative, every middle school and high school student in Maine was granted access to first a laptop, and later an iPad, to help them advance their 21st-Century skills.

But the gift came with virtually little to zero training on ethical digital behaviors and cyberbullying. I know, because throughout the 2000s, I was doing public presentations on cyberbullying for schools.

In 2012, when our cyberbullying book came out, a law passed in Maine mandating every single middle and high school enact a cyberbullying policy with training for the kids and for the staff.

I went around to schools and conferences on top of my full time job, for more than a year and gave free presentations to schools about sexting and other forms of cyberbullying. It opened the eyes of administrators and staff from dozens of Maine schools; but in 2013, still doing these presentations, I can honestly say, maybe three to four of the schools I visited got serious about the policy.

No school I knew of had, at that point, implemented any serious cyberbullying training or curriculum. (Not just some half-day assembly that students would forget in a few weeks.)

This, is of course, a field observation. Things might have changed now. I know MLTI offers Common Sense Media’s free Digital Literacy and Citizenship curriculum to schools, but it’s such light lunch. It does not get into the roots of serious cyberbullying (with all of its various moving parts).

I know teachers and administrators have earnestly tried to get a handle on this, but they’re not getting supported at the top.

So, it’s up to the parents. That’s what I’ve concluded after three years of working to try and turn Maine’s cyberbullying problem around. There has been woefully little done to even address it, much less turn it around. Three years after this law passed, Maine still ranks dead last in New England for controlling cyberbullying according to the latest study. Massachusetts ranks first nationally.

So, what can you do? First, it doesn’t matter what the app was used in this sexting extortion. (For the record, it was Snapchat).

If you kill the app off your kid’s phone, another toxic one will spring up in six months. Guaranteed. What you have to do is have ‘The Conversation’ when it comes to your kids’ use of digital devices.

The Conversation is a three-pronged approach, based on the strategies of self-defense:

1. Discuss what you consider acceptable and unacceptable uses of your child’s digital device. Here's how one Massachusetts mom got her son to sign an 18-point agreement on the condition of receiving his new iPhone. Use her strategy. Likely you already own the devices and that's your leverage.
2. Get familiar with the most frequent apps and social media platforms your teen is drawn to. Don't know what these tactics are? Stay on top of it with our Hot Topics blog on the most common types of cyberbullying.
3. Next, have a talk about conflict. Conflict is the root of most cyberbullying situations and it is inevitable your child will be involved in conflict at some point with a friend, a boyfriend/girlfriend, a teacher or even a stranger. Whether your child is the target, the instigator or caught in the cross-fire, "pre-playing" the potential outcomes to the conflict is key.

Lastly, here’s my professional opinion on the app Snapchat used in this particular situation.

Snapchat is a free app for iPhones, iPads and Android phones, allowing you to send a photo that will supposedly disappear in 10 seconds.

It was originally designed so the recipient couldn’t save the photo, but there have been workarounds for years to thwart that without Snapchat notifying the sender.

For minors, (and even impressionable young adults above 18) it is a sure fire way to get in legal trouble with even just one mistake. It guarantees many years of emotional pain and self-loathing when that “mistake,” a nude selfie, gets into the hands of a malicious person who shares or publicizes it.

If you have had The Conversation and you trust your teen 100 percent that he or she will never make that mistake, it’s your call to let him or her keep Snapchat and/or other apps like it on their digital devices. But if you even have a single doubt, get rid of it off your minor’s phone, iPad or digital device.

That’s my blunt advice.

Ignore the cries, “But everybody has it. I’ll be unpopular.”

Refer them to the 18-point agreement.

Here’s how to delete the app off each device:

1. Go to https://support.snapchat.com/delete-account in any web browser.
2. Enter your Snapchat username and password.(See 18-point agreement once again for this password)
3. Check the box confirming you aren't a robot.
4. Click on Submit.
5. Re-enter your password on the next page.
6. Click on Delete My Account.

Kay Stephens is a writer for Penobscot Bay Pilot, as well as an award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction. Her book, Cyberslammed, was used by the Maine Department of Education, in part, to draw up a sample cyberbullying policy for schools in Maine. More help for parents and schools, including the latest threats, cyberbullying apps and tactics can be found at cyberslammed.com

With more screen time in the summer, conflicts that started in school, have more of a chance to fester in unsupervised settings. Get these books loaded onto your Kindle and arm yourself with some practical resources on what to do if your teen faces or is embroiled in cyberbullying this summer!

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The number one question parents continue to ask around digital safety is: "What do I do if my child becomes a target of cyberbullying?" Unfortunately, so much of the cyberbullying advice you find online only scratches the surface, such as: "Save all the evidence. Tell an adult." This is about as helpful as a skydiving instructor shouting out instructions on how to pull the ripcord after you've already jumped.

To protect your kids against cyberbullying, you must take a proactive approach. Cyberbullying is like war with methods of attack and strategies of self-defense. Do not wait until the moment your child experiences online defamation and harassment to formulate a plan.  In our award-winning cyberbullying guide for adults, Cyberslammed, we employ the strategic advice of a martial artist, who also happens to be a bullying counselor.

First, start with the basic strategies of self-defense.

How many digital devices does your child use? If you haven't already had a conversation with your child on what is considered acceptable and unacceptable behavior surrounding the use of these devices, start now. Likely you already own the devices and that's your leverage. Here's how one Massachusetts mom got her son to sign an 18-point agreement on the condition of receiving his new iPhone. Use her strategy to discuss cell phone and computer use with your child.

Next, get familiar with the most frequent apps and social media platforms your teen is drawn to. Learn how cyberbullying really works on these particular platforms. For example, Twitter is great for teen connection, but it is also being used as a "slut-shaming" tool and a virtual slam book. Don't know what these tactics are? Stay on top of it with our Hot Topics blog on the most common types of cyberbullying.

Next, have a talk about conflict. Conflict is the root of most cyberbullying situations and it is inevitable your child will be involved in conflict at some point with a friend, a boyfriend/girlfriend, a teacher or even a stranger. Whether your child is the target, the instigator or caught in the cross-fire, "pre-playing" the potential outcomes to the conflict is key. My mother used to call this the "What would you do?" game. What would you do if a rival called you a "slut" on Facebook? What would you do if your XBox gaming buddy tried to get other multi-players to gang up on you online? The key to heading off cyberbullying is building a plan of action...not reaction ahead of time.

Do you see now why "telling an adult and saving evidence" is practically useless advice if the adult in the situation still has no idea what to do? We encourage adults to approach a cyberbullying incident exactly the same way we instruct kids:

Cool Off: Take time to cool off and talk it through before making an emotional snap judgment about the cyberbully’s actions. The emotional mind works much faster than the rational mind and skips important steps when you are angry and upset. Don’t react when you are in “flight or fight mode” out of defensiveness and anger and wait until your rational mind has had a chance to catch up.

Gather Perspective: To get to the bottom of the issue, gather additional perspective from as many other students and adults who were directly involved. When dealing with the cyberbully's parents, acknowledge that you are presenting your kid’s “truth” and don’t make assumptions until you’ve heard the other “truths” to the story as well. Remember: what may at first appear to be clear-cut may, in fact, only be a snapshot in an ongoing, more complicated conflict.

Make A Plan: Depending on the severity of the cyberbullying incident, find your allies, from school authorities to website/service providers to counselors to the child's own peers. In severe situations, you may also need to get the police or even an attorney, involved. This option needs to be carefully considered when there is serious harassment/threats, criminal behavior, extortion, obscene or harassing phone calls/texts, stalking, hate crimes, child pornography, sexual exploitation, or when the target’s photograph has been taken in a place where he or she would expect privacy and is now being misused.

As you work with others to resolve the cyberbullying situation, make sure your child never tries to "fight fire with fire" by responding to the online attack with a counter attack, for this will only worsen the situation and muddy the waters in determining who is culpable for cyberbullying.

Finally, experts in our book say the way to build your child's resiliency throughout an attack is be a support for him or her daily. Inviting peer support during this time is also crucial to getting through a traumatic incident.

Every cyberbullying situation is different, but this advice goes beyond the surface in helping you and your child be proactive. To learn more, including how to join our free monthly webinars, visit: www.cyberslammed.com


Kay Stephens is the co-author of the award-winning cyberbullying book Cyberslammed, sponsored by Time Warner Cable. Her latest tween cyberbullying e-book Ethel Is Hot LOL (Amazon $4.95) features Ethel, a smart-but-oddball 12-year-old who wants to be a NASA psychologist. Ethel finds herself blindsided by two girls looking for YouTube fame until she figures out a way to turn the media tables and get her reputation back.

It's always a relief to hear a cyberbullying story with a positive outcome. In this Washington teen's case, she found the resilience to move on...something that doesn't always happen for teens.

According to the Issaquah Press, in 2011, "then 12-year-old Leslie Cote was the victim of cyberbullying, as two classmates hacked into her social media page and posted altered photos, including one with 'I’m a slut' superimposed on it."

For parents and educators wondering what this tactic is: it's called an Imposter Profile, when the cyberbully sets up a fake website or profile (or hacks into a real one as in this case) and gets the profile's followers to believe it is genuinely owned by the target. This kind of tactic has a lot of power and the cyberbully can do immense reputation damage in a very short time. Another subtactic the cyberbullies used was "slut-shaming"--to try and publicly make Leslie feel guilty or inferior for certain sexual behaviors (even when she didn't engage in them!)

The article further states the cyberbullies altered their attacks by using "the site’s instant messaging service to act as Leslie to proposition boys for sexual acts." Again, this is still using the Imposter Profile tactic, only now the cyberbullies were actively communicating through IM as though they were Leslie with the sole purpose to embarrass and defame her reputation. Subsequently, the girls were charged with cyberstalking and first-degree computer trespassing.

The summer after this incident, Leslie wouldn't even go outside all summer as one of her cyberbullies lived in the same building as her.

Now Leslie is in high school with some of the girls who cyberbullied her and even has to sit next to one of them in one class. But, luckily, the support of her family and her own strength and resilience has helped her gain perspective.

As the article quotes her mother Tara:  "Leslie said she’s not angry with the girls anymore, but it has taken her some time to get to that point. At first, you have anger, you’re upset and you have rage, but now I think she feels more sorry for them."

For anyone who has ever been cyberbullied, it's gratifying to know there are kids like Leslie out there who refuse to let the traumatic incident forever define them. Good for you, Leslie. Stay strong and thank you for helping other kids after what you've been through.

To read the full article: http://www.issaquahpress.com/2014/03/25/cyberbullying-victim-puts-past-behind-her/


Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

WAH-LAH!  (Yes, we know that is not correct French.) Here is the latest cyberbullying novel from Kay Stephens, award-winning co-author of the cyberbullying guide for adults, Cyberslammed™

Ethel Is Hot LOL features twelve-year-old Ethel F. Effleby, who goes to the Seaside School for Girls, a science and leadership middle school in Maine. After moving in with her Gram, Ethel is just fine with her oddball self until a group of girls create a website called Ethel Is Hot LOL!! making fun of her and her family secrets. When the cyberbullying gets so bad that she has to face her enemy, Stephönë on national TV, Ethel confronts her greatest fear yet. To clear her name will she have to expose her humiliation to the world?

Email us if you'd like to review the new novel and receive it for free! Info@cyberslammed.com

The frustration of anonymous cyberbullying hits just about every school principal in every state. It's been going on for more than a decade, yet schools are still trying to wrap their heads around how to stop it. According to an article in www.publicopiniononline.com this school principal had had it up to here about some Twitter cyberbullying perpetrated by anonymous students. It's not entirely clear from the article, but the tactic sounds very similar to a Twitter Burn Book, in which the perpetrators posted negative comments about other students and faculty and encouraged bystanders to pile on.

I can certainly understand the frustration of this principal. There's a tendency to want to put a zero-tolerance policy in place in the face of out-of-control cyberbullying. But then, I noticed the "Acceptable Use" policy in the article. This is essentially the "guidelines" of many schools around a student's use of technology at school. However, it is completely inadequate in terms of defining for parents and students EXACTLY what constitutes cyberbullying behaviors.

Example of their "Acceptable Use" policy of prohibited behaviors:

• Use inappropriate language.
• Engage in personal attacks and harrassment of others.

Read: CASD Student Acceptable Use and Social Media Form

The problem is, most schools' Acceptable Use policies are a decade out of touch,  entirely too vague and open to interpretation. "Engage in personal attacks?" So, according to this guideline, if a kid calls another kid a "jerk" on his Facebook page, is that the definition of cyberbullying?

No. No. No.

It is an unkind word,  but does not fit the true definition of cyberbullying. But, how would administrators know that if they don't actually know what constitutes cyberbullying? It's like relying on non-attorneys to interpret a legal document. If you don't actually know what cyberbullying behaviors are, then you're likely to misinterpret them.

A better policy defines it like this:

Examples of conduct that may constitute cyberbullying include, but are not limited to:

1. Posting slurs or rumors or displaying any defamatory, inaccurate, disparaging, violent, abusive, profane, or sexually oriented material about a student on a website or other online application;
2. Posting misleading or fake photographs or digital video footage of a student on websites or creating fake websites or social networking profiles in the guise of posing as the target;
3. Impersonating or representing another student through use of that other student’s electronic device or account to send e-mail, text messages, instant messages (IM), or phone calls;
4. Sending e-mail, text messages, IM, or leaving voice mail messages that are mean or threatening, or so numerous as to bombard the target’s e-mail account, IM account, or cell phone; and
5. Using a camera phone or digital video camera to take and/or send embarrassing or “sexting” photographs of other students.

How are students supposed to intrinsically know what not to do if the administration has not provided any specific training around acceptable and unacceptable behaviors? You can't punish students without first defining what specific behaviors lead to specific consequences.

The better approach is to draft a specific cyberbullying policy and then institute compassionate training for both students and teachers. Education is the only way to stop this. All experts repeatedly say this. But a school has to be willing to put in the extra time and effort to invest in social-emotional training.

Maine, our home state, put together a very comprehensive school policy on Internet use and cyberbullying, using parts of our cyberbullying book, Cyberslammed.  If you really want to get the cart in front of the horse,

• Update your school policies now. Click to see a good example
  
• Implement some long-range cyberbullying training for staff and students (not just some fly-by- night assembly that students will forget in six weeks.)
• Use resources like Cyberslammed and other cyberbullying prevention curricula like Common Sense Media to effectively guide the trainings.

Cyberslammed was used in part to construct Maine's official cyberbullying policy for all schools. Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying.  Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

The Allure and Danger of Posting Selfies Online is the second video in our webinar series to help give you a better understanding of Internet Safety and Cyberbullying.  Kay Stephens, co-author of Cyberslammed, tells us some things to consider before posting a selfie, ways that they are being used to cyberbully and how you can help protect your teen.

Click here to watch the 5 min webinar.  

Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Summer Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book


Welcome to our new short webinar series on what to watch for in Internet Safety and Cyberbullying

You can't stop cyberbulling if you can't define it. Our new digital savvy online class series will get you up to speed quickly on the tactics, techie apps and behaviors that lead to negative online interactions so you can be prepared to help a teen in your life prevent getting cyberbullied. This overview is the first in our six-part series.

Click here to watch the short 8 min webinar.

Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

Over the last six months, experts have noticed a shift in the way teens are communicating. Tired of of the transparency and parental monitoring of Facebook, many are searching for more anonymous alternatives and are gravitating toward social networking sites like Whisper and Instagram.  New month, different app, that's the way it goes. Parents and teachers can't keep up. (Not surprisingly, by the time they do, that's the cue for the teens to move on.)  Instagram, a photo sharing app that can be registered under an anonymous screenname, is like an underground speakeasy. Adults aren't hip to all the hidden back rooms yet, making it a perfect app to be used as a cyberbullying tool.

Even though Instagram's Community Guidelines prohibit nudity and graphic sexual poses, within two minutes, I was able to find dozens and dozens of pages depicting drug use, slut-shaming women, and graphic, explicit nudity. (Some of these photos I don't doubt are underage, which would categorize it as child pornography).

Yes, this is where a lot of teens have found their new outlet. And to be fair, many teens simply use Instagram the way it was intended, to share photos with friends and be social. I'm not sure why Instagram allows the other photos to stay online given their Guidelines, but just earlier this month, a Napa California police department investigated an Instagram page after receiving multiple reports  that it contained “inappropriate” images of females.

The  images were posted on a page called “napahoezexxposed." Translation: Napa Hoez Exxposed-- an Instagram page dedicated to labeling certain girls and women as whores. This is a combined Sexting and Rating Site tactic where someone uploaded photos of females (allegedly without their consent) in various stages of undress (thus Sexting) with the motive to slut-shame these girls by allowing commenters to rate them (thus a Rating Site). I've seen multiple versions of the so-called "Exposing Hos" tactic on Facebook and Twitter, but, apparently Instagram is the new technological vehicle for the same type of behavior. 

Time Magazine's recent article "What Boys Want" by Rosalind  Wiseman recently featured a fascinating article on why today's teens engage in Sexting, even when they know of the steep risks. The takeway I got from this article is that with this digital generation so used to the casual release of Kim Kardashian-type of sex tapes, snapping a nude pic or photographing a sexually explicit pose isn't as a big deal to this generation as it should be.  Certain teens (particularly those with low-self esteem) tend to have a careless regard for their own image and reputation and just don't think about the consequences to such actions.  When sending a nude photo to a someone is the only way you'll get his/her attention or keep his/her attraction, there are bigger issues here than the actual photo. The same goes for teens who request the photos as status symbols and insurance (in case of being rejected.)

Regardless, you can now see how the stage has been set for using these photos as cyberbullying currency. With teenage girls, we must keep the conversation going about alternatives to Sexting, not from a prudish standpoint, but from a reputation-destroying-forever-online standpoint. No girl wants a private "for your eyes only" photo to go virally, embarrassingly public. But, as statistics show,  it inevitably will.  And today, when a lapse in judgment results in being branded a whore on the Internet for all to comment on and judge, this is the time to talk to that teen in your life about that secret photo on his/her phone they hope you'll never find out about.


Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

A while back, this photo on a Facebook site called "Girls Did You Know"  stirred up one of the latest cyberbullying memes called "slut shaming "in which woman or a girl is shamed online and/or attacked  for being sexual, having one or more sexual partners, acknowledging sexual feelings, and/or acting on sexual feelings" according to Finally Feminism 101.

First, let's get our definitions straight. This photo above, which triggered a Good Morning America segment on the topic of bullying is not cyberbullying any particular target, It is a parody. The girl in the photo is clearly the author of the sentiment--she is not being targeted herself.

Slut-shaming, a topic we cover in Cyberslammed, however, is very real and while the above photo is not a proper example, all it takes is a provocative self-portrait or a Sexting image/video to get loose on the Internet before a nasty Digital Pile On happens.

Sixteen-year-old reporter Temitayo Fagbenle whose column "Online 'Shaming' A New Level Of Cyberbullying For Girls" on NPR said, "A recent Facebook posting I saw had a picture of a half-naked girl, lying on bed. The boy who posted it tagged the picture so that everyone could see it and go to the girl's page. Within less than an hour, the photo had about 443 likes and 261 comments. Comments like "your life is officially shot LMAO," and "I think she gonna cut her veins when she see this."

People post these pictures and videos and make "smut lists" for their neighborhood or school.

The boy who put up the picture posted a status update saying he received 2,000 friend requests because of the photo; and things like this are a regular occurrence at my school."

And it's not just boys who engage in slut-shaming cyberbullying. As Fagbenle stated, "Talking to a group of girls at my school about this online slut shaming, some of them say they often feel the need to shame other girls for their improper behavior. 'They do it to themselves,' one girl says. 'Half the time we can't even blame the guys.' "

Regardless of who is doing the slut-shaming as a cyberbullying tactic, keep this in mind. Many times girls are photographed and videotaped without their knowledge and against their will (as in the case of Reddit's  Creepshots, i.e. upskirt photos taken of high school girls without their knowledge).

They clearly don't deserve the harassment. Girls who willingly engage in sexting or videotaping their own sexual experiences are horrified to learn this information has been shared (inevitably) when the couple breaks up.  But do they deserve to have a sexting photo or video go viral for the peverse entertainment of others? Absolutely not.

What about the girls who post photos of themselves, clothed, but provocatively posed?

In this digital age age of abuse and misuse, it's vain, narcissistic and just plain stupid for girls to ever post sexualized "selfies", i.e. self-taken photos showing, but that is their choice. (Did I also mention it's incredibly niaive to assume overly sexualized images won't be manipulated and spread around in some way? Of course it will--it's Internet currency.) But girls who are navigating their own sexuality never deserve to be defamed, libeled and ridiculed on such slut-shaming sites as These Hoes Getting Exposed.


Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book

The word Melcher-Dallas high school is searching for is ... Videojacking.

An Iowa high school ruled that  several videos students took of another student, Levi Null, 13, who has Asperger's Syndrome and ADHD--doesn't "meet the criteria" for bullying and the school board President, Bob Lepley, says he stands by the principal's decision (via Gawker).

The students videotaped Null's involuntary movements without his knowledge or permission and posted them online with school computers. Further, they videotaped other kids hitting, smacking and teasing Null.

Cyberbullying is the use of cell phones, instant messaging, e-mail, chat rooms or social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter and YouTube to harass, threaten or intimidate someone.

Though I personally did not view these videos (Melcher-Dallas high school claims they've all been taken offline and destroyed), the very existence of them is a cyberbullying tactic known as Videojacking: When someone videotapes a target without his knowledge/approval and uploads the video to a popular video-sharing websites.

Here is the news story on WHOTV. It is quite obvious to anyone that Null felt harassed, threatened and intimidated.

This school has set a dangerous precedent to refuse to categorize these students' behavior as cyberbullying. Moreover, they had an opportunity to re-evaluate their school policy to further define a tactic they clearly had no previous experiences with and update the policy to protect this student from mob-like behavior.  But they didn't. That alone is hard to believe, but when, according to WHOTV, the students used school computers to upload these videos--there were still no consequences, I have to ask:  is it any surprise that kids  constantly report they feel unsafe at schools when so many adults on the other side of the Digital Divide are operating with an inadequate understanding of what they're up against?

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Earlier this month, a 15-year old from St. Petersburg, FL was arrested for sending “hundreds of threatening text messages” over the course of eight days to former friends. Some were even death threats. The suspect used a smartphone app called Kik Messenger, which happens to be the cyberbullying app du jour, also used in the Rebecca Ann Sedwick cyberbullying case that contributed to her suicide. Kik allows users to send text messages from an Internet Desk Top to cell phones.

The tactic is called “text bombing”

Huffington Post writer Ann Brenoff deftly addresses this tactic in her article, “What Every Parent Needs to Know About Text Bombs.” Her article did a great job identifying some of the apps used to do the cyberbully’s “dirty work,” but before we get into that, let’s drill down a little deeper into the motivation behind text bombing.

With text bombing, there are two ways to inflict harm.

The first way, like most cyberbullying tactics, is rooted in emotional conflict. The ex-friend, the ex-beau, the jealous peer, etc. lashes out in anger, and in extreme moment, repeatedly texts the most hurtful thing anyone can think of, e.g., you don’t matter. Go kill yourself. I will find you and destroy you.

For example, in the St. Petersburg case, the teen suspect learned that one of her target’s relatives had recently committed suicide, so she began bombarding her ex-friend with messages to do the same.

The second way to text bomb relies on apps to do the dirty work by sending a message hundreds of times as a way to harass the target, break their phone or even cost them money. Popular text bombing apps mentioned in Brenoff’s article included SMSBOMBER (Android) and SMSBARRAGE before the Google App store got wise to it and banned them.  However, these text-bombing apps can be found anywhere. A simple Google search finds more SMS bombing apps like those from Cydia that anyone can learn to use in minutes.

With my cyberbullying columns, I’m always trying to identify the latest tactic and provide educators and parents with technological and behavior tips to prevent it.

First the tech tips: The way to block multiple duplicated messages from any sender is through Anti-SMS Text Bomb (Android). The link to this page also includes several other anti-sms bombing apps for other phones.

And according to NY Daily News, there’s a new app being developed, called STOPit, which students download to their phones. It enables students to easily capture malicious behavior with their Apple or Droid smart phone and send it to adult contacts or officials with the touch of a button — and in some cases anonymously.

As usual, the public reaction to this text bomb tactic is shrill, bordering on exasperation. Said one HuffPo commenter: “Here's an idea.....don't give a cell phone to a kid [who] doesn't think that each and every keystroke equals $$$$$$. If they are STILL too young to understand the value of a $ then they are too young for a cell phone.”

According to the latest Pew Internet and American Life study on Teens and Technology (March 2013) 78% of teens (12-17) now have a cell phone, and almost half (47%) of those own smartphones. An earlier study in 2010,  found that most teenagers with cell phones have family plans paid by their parents.

When you give a child or teenager a cell phone or computer of any type, you are giving them limitless power to do good or to do harm. And likely, you are footing the bill, so you already have leverage for encouraging their ethical behavior around texting.

An ongoing conversation needs to accompany the privilege of owning a smartphone. Do you discuss with your child:

• Sending any form of text bomb is considered harassment and will not be tolerated. Do you spell out the consequences for this behavior?
• Does your child know they don’t have the right to say anything they want? Anytime a child’s language approaches bodily threats and harassment, it is not protected by freedom of speech and it is quite conceivable he or she can be arrested.
• Does your child know some states are considering holding the parents’ liable for the child’s cyberbullying actions?

The tools, the tactics and the technology are all going to change. Six months down the road; we are likely going to have a whole new set of apps and digital devices connected with cyberbullying. But the conversation between kids and their parents (and schools) should be about the expected and appropriate behavior when handed a technological device. Are you having that conversation already?

Get all of the tactics in one book and prepare your child to recognize and defuse certain types of cyberbullying. Sale: $12.50 Buy The Book