The schoolyard bully now harasses peers with websites, e-mails and text messages.
Called e-bullying, this hi-tech version of shoving and stealing lunch money is on the increase in Ireland, especially in the past few years, says Lían McGuire, administrator at Trinity College Dublin's Anti-Bullying Centre.
An Irish boys' school recently suspended students after discovering that a website hosted on its own server attacked another student.
In Dublin, Rebekah, aged 16, writes of her e-bullies on www.bullying.org/, "They got a hold of my mobile number and every night I would get horrible phone calls and text messages from lads and girls calling me fat and ugly."
The rise in e-bullying cases reported to the anti-bullying centre coincides with an increase in mobile phone ownership among Irish 12- to 14-year-olds. Two years ago, 61 per cent owned a mobile, compared with 83 per cent today, according to an Amárach Consulting Generation T study, conducted in July and August of this year.
The study also reports that of 12- to 14-year-old mobile owners, all use text messaging and each sends an average of 40 messages per week. Regarding Internet use, 54 per cent of Irish 12-14-year-olds regularly go online.
In Britain, children's charity NCH reported in April "one in four \ students have been bullied or threatened via their mobile phone or PC."
Of the 865 people aged 11-19 NCH surveyed, 16 per cent had received bullying text messages, 7 per cent had been harassed in Internet chat rooms and 4 per cent with e-mails.
NCH recommends that victims of e-bullying tell an adult, change their mobile number or email address and keep records of the time and date messages were received to show police.
