CDZ Trolljägarna - Troll Hunters - Coming to a Town Near You?

[Tilly]

This is interesting, trolls being hunted down and semi-identified by journalists on national tv in Sweden. Other countries, ie NZ, seem to be becoming less tolerant of trolls and are even beginning to pass anti troll legislation. Should trolls be tolerated, ignored, or legislated against?

Computing
The Troll Hunters

A group of journalists and researchers wade into ugly corners of the Internet to expose racists, creeps, and hypocrites. Have they gone too far?

• by Adrian Chen
  
• December 18, 2014

.....It is generally no longer acceptable in public life to hurl slurs at women or minorities, to rally around the idea that some humans are inherently worth less than others, or to terrorize vulnerable people. But old-school hate is having a sort of renaissance online, and in the countries thought to be furthest beyond it. The anonymity provided by the Internet fosters communities where people can feed on each other’s hate without consequence. They can easily form into mobs and terrify victims. Individual trolls can hide behind dozens of screen names to multiply their effect. And attempts to curb online hate must always contend with the long-standing ideals that imagine the Internet’s main purpose as offering unfettered space for free speech and marginalized ideas. The struggle against hate online is so urgent and difficult that the law professor Danielle Citron, in her new book Hate Crimes in Cyberspace, calls the Internet “the next battleground for civil rights.”.....

The Troll Hunters

 

[Tilly]

NZ are taking it hard core:

New Zealand makes internet 'trolling' illegal
Supporters believe it will help mitigate the harm caused by cyber-bulling but critics say it is a threat to free speech

By Flynn Murphy, Sydney

10:20AM BST 08 Jul 2015


Internet trolls face up to two years' jail in New Zealand under a controversial new law which bans “harmful digital communications”.

And under a parallel amendment to New Zealand's Crimes Act, a person who tells another to kill themselves faces up to three years in prison.

The law will help mitigate the harm caused by cyber-bulling and give victims a quick and effective means of redress, supporters said.

But critics said the law harms free speech and its fine print could threaten public interest journalism in the country.

Under the Harmful Digital Communications Act in effect from this week, anyone convicted of “causing harm by posting digital communication” faces two years in prison and a $50,000 (NZ) (£6,500) fine, while businesses face fines of up to $200,000 (NZ).

Harmful communications can include truthful as well as false information, and “intimate visual recordings” such as nude or seminude pictures or video shared without permission. ...

New Zealand makes internet 'trolling' illegal

 

[Tilly]

In the UK:

...There were more than 16,000 crime reports involving the two social media giants last year alone, according to statistics obtained by the U.K. Press Association under the Freedom of Information Act.

The numbers suggest the government is cracking down on internet trolls who maliciously abuse social media users. In 2014, there were 1,209 court rulings related to Section 127 of the Communications Act, as well as 694 people convicted under the similar Malicious Communications Act.

Offences under the two acts can range from sending grossly offensive or menacing messages to persistently causing anxiety via an electronic network.

British police struggle to cope with internet trolls, curb abusers...

 

[Dhara]

Trolls are more likely to display noxious personality characteristics, that is, traits that impair one’s ability to build relations and function in a civilised or pro-social way. In a comprehensive examination of their psychological profile, trolls were found to be more Machiavellian (impulsive and charming manipulators), psychopathic (cold, fearless and antisocial), and especially sadist than the overall population. Trolls enjoy harming and intimidating others, so much so that the authors of this study concluded that trolls are “prototypical everyday sadists”, and that trolling should be regarded as online sadism. This is in line with the view of trolling as a form of cyberbullying.
trolling – like other forms of computer-mediated communication – unleashes people’s impulses by providing anonymity and temporary identity loss. This phenomenon, called deindividuation, is well known to psychologists and has been found to emerge in several areas of interpersonal relations, such as gaming, role-playing and crowd behaviours, particularly hooliganism. Thus even when we are not naturally sadistic, trolling may bring out the worst side in us, by lifting the moral constrains and social etiquette that regulates our behaviour in normal situations, and by fuelling dissent and triggering abrasive reactions.

Third, trolling is a status-enhancing activity: by attracting readers’ attention, upsetting people, sparking heated debates, and even gaining approval from others, trolls can feel important, perhaps much more than they are in their real lives. Thus trolling is yet another internet activity that promotes narcissistic motives, since trolls may be expected to be far less successful in attracting people’s attention in the physical world. The only effective antidote to their tactics is to ignore them, but even then trolls won’t suffer a public humiliation because nobody knows who they are. This is what makes trolling so ubiquitous – it requires no skills other than the ability to be obnoxious.

Behind the online comments: the psychology of internet trolls

Who would have thought?

 

[Dhara]

Trolls should be ignored, except when they wreak total havoc into someone else's life. Then they should be prosecuted and banned from communities to end their damage.

 

[320 Years of History]

It is generally no longer acceptable in public life to hurl slurs

...Do you find something wrong with hurling slurs to begin with? I sure do.

 

[Dhara]

Trolls are "everyday sadists"
Internet trolls are psychopaths, says expert

 

[Dhara]

Tracking Down a Troll

BBC News - Panorama - Panorama confronts an internet troll

 

[Dhara]

 

[Dhara]

Mum turns troll-hunter and forces 500 cyberbullies off the internet

 

[Tilly]

Mum turns troll-hunter and forces 500 cyberbullies off the internet

Poor woman. Interesting:

....She tells how three years ago she herself joined a support group on Facebook called Angel Mums after suffering the trauma of a miscarriage. But soon after joining, she says the group was overrun with tormenters who bombarded the women with horrifying messages of abuse, posting pictures of aborted foetuses and making jokes about dead children.

Horrified to discover such behaviour even existed, she checked the Facebook and Twitter accounts used by her children, and was appalled to find several examples of them being targeted by bullies.

“The comments my daughter had sent to her were horrendous,” she says. “I messaged these anonymous people myself and told them I had printed every message and had taken them to the police. They stopped. But there are children out there who have nowhere to turn to.”

Now Kaitlin spends up to eight hours a day rooting out the identities of those responsible for placing the contemptible messages on tribute pages and websites used by charity groups.

If she finds out a troll’s name, their Facebook profile page or their website address she emails the details straight to the people responsible for policing the sites where the abuse appears. She also emails the trolls directly, warning them she is handing their messages to police.

Kaitlin is a member of Stop cyber-bullying and Trolls, a group of like-minded parents uniting against online thugs. Members share links to profiles and pages that are being targeted by bullies. They include fan pages for celebrities, tribute pages to the deceased or support groups for people suffering from physical or mental health problems.

Kaitlin’s tactics involve bombarding the bullies with messages, asking them to explain their actions.....

 

[Dhara]

Mum turns troll-hunter and forces 500 cyberbullies off the internet

Poor woman. Interesting:

....She tells how three years ago she herself joined a support group on Facebook called Angel Mums after suffering the trauma of a miscarriage. But soon after joining, she says the group was overrun with tormenters who bombarded the women with horrifying messages of abuse, posting pictures of aborted foetuses and making jokes about dead children.

Horrified to discover such behaviour even existed, she checked the Facebook and Twitter accounts used by her children, and was appalled to find several examples of them being targeted by bullies.

“The comments my daughter had sent to her were horrendous,” she says. “I messaged these anonymous people myself and told them I had printed every message and had taken them to the police. They stopped. But there are children out there who have nowhere to turn to.”

Now Kaitlin spends up to eight hours a day rooting out the identities of those responsible for placing the contemptible messages on tribute pages and websites used by charity groups.

If she finds out a troll’s name, their Facebook profile page or their website address she emails the details straight to the people responsible for policing the sites where the abuse appears. She also emails the trolls directly, warning them she is handing their messages to police.

Kaitlin is a member of Stop cyber-bullying and Trolls, a group of like-minded parents uniting against online thugs. Members share links to profiles and pages that are being targeted by bullies. They include fan pages for celebrities, tribute pages to the deceased or support groups for people suffering from physical or mental health problems.

Kaitlin’s tactics involve bombarding the bullies with messages, asking them to explain their actions.....

Kaitlin and others like this are my heroes.

 

[Dhara]

Public humiliation is never more entertaining than when it’s justified. That probably explains the success of Swedish TV show Trolljägarna, or Troll Hunters. It follows journalist Robert Aschberg as he tracks down so-called “trolls” who have posted hate speech in social forums or abused individuals online and then confronts them on-camera.

The entertainment value is evident from the show’s first episode (and in its spread to neighboring Norway, Denmark, and Holland with a similar production being considered in the UK, according to Henrik Stenlund, former CEO of production company Strix Television). When Alexander, 20, walks across a parking lot in Sweden to greet Aschberg and his TV crew, the young man thinks they’re about to discuss a potential new show.

But Aschberg is there to confront Alexander with a self-posted Facebook video in which he aggressively rants against a young woman who has openly talked about being raped. In the video, which provoked a storm of abusive comments directed at the young woman, he calls her a liar, along with various other words that would have likely been bleeped on American TV. All of it is documented in the printed transcript that Aschberg pulls out and starts reading.
Should journalists expose trolls?

 

[Dhara]

Clementine Ford, a feminist writer in Australia, was called a slut on her Facebook page by a man named Michael Nolan. She looked at Nolan's Facebook page, saw that his employer was listed and then contacted that employer and shared Nolan's comment.

Nolan, according to Ford and numerous media reports, was fired.
Companies can help tackle Internet trolls

 

[Dhara]

Trolls are easy to recognize by their mode of operation. They will never compliment you for a smart statement, or admit that your question is difficult to respond to, or tone down the rhetoric with a smiley emoticon.

Trolls accuse and insult. Trolls needle you relentlessly. They love to flame others. They enjoy causing grief, making another person feel bad. Trolls will quickly move from serious discussion about an issue to a sustained personal assault.

The goal of a troll is to disrupt an online discussion, picking on one person, or on everyone who expresses a particular point of view.
(1) Ignore the troll. Just refuse to interact with him. Respond to others in an online discussion, but shun the troll and give no reply to any of his accusations or remarks.

(2) Post "don't feed the trolls" in the debate thread and leave the conversation. Let others deal with him if they want. Just identify the troublemaker as a troll and move on to other websites or activities. If a person is trolling you via email, just stop opening and reading their messages. If you can blacklist them to prevent them from sending you emails, do that. If it's on Facebook, block -- don't just unfriend, but block – the person and if necessary, report him as abusive.

(3) Keep hammering away at your viewpoint, harden yourself like steel, and never give in. If you want to disturb the troll for a short while, just to give him a taste of his own medicine, you can relentlessly restate your opinion, in complete oblivion to anything the troll says, like you're not even reading his remarks.

(4) Misinterpret his statements. This is a very effective technique for derailing a troll and making them upset. You may even provoke the troll to give up and leave the conversation thread. Twist what they say and make it seem like the troll is agreeing with you. "I agree. Thanks for seeing my viewpoint. We seem to be on the same page now. That's exactly right. Glad I was able to convert you to my opinion."

(5) Praise the troll in a facetious way that translates into not-so-subtle rebuke. "Oh my, you are so incredibly well informed. You are the smartest person in the whole universe and everyone should sit at your feet and soak up your wisdom. Nobody can argue with you, for you have all the answers." Then sign off and leave the discussion with "You sad and silly troll."

Remember that the only purpose of a troll is to antagonize and cause trouble. There is no point in trying to reason with a troll.

How to Identify and Defeat an Internet Troll

 

[Dhara]

How to Identify and Defeat an Internet Troll

 

[Dhara]

Anti-troll software:

Creates a “digital fingerprint” for every user who signs up for an account to comment. The software logs identifying information—your IP address, your device ID (each device, be it a computer, mobile phone, or tablet has a unique device ID), your browser ID, your cookies, your device’s stated location, your actual, physical location, and more.

It also logs “behavioral biometrics”—things like how quickly you type and how you move your mouse around your screen as you surf the web. Researchers at the College of William and Mary say “mouse dynamics”—that is, the pattern you create as you move your mouse around your screen—“are relatively unique from person to person and independent of the computing platform.” In other words, Trustev for Publishers can tell you’re you, even if you switch devices, IP addresses, or even your physical location. “What we’ve built here is a complete key that’s absolutely able to ID trolls at a very, very high likelihood,” Phelan tells me.

Once the software has your fingerprint, Phelan says a publisher can use it to ban you from commenting—forever. “We have an intelligent blacklist that allows us to constantly scan for these behaviors,” Phelan says.

For now, Trustev is marketing their software to publishers, but Bradbury thinks content platforms like Twitter and Facebook could also benefit. “All it takes is a small number of people being abusive on Twitter to spoil it for everyone,” he says. He hopes his company’s new software will “change the dynamic” between abusers and publishers. “Hopefully, if [abusers] realize they can be blocked, it will modify behaviors and change the places they congregate.”

http://www.newsweek.com/one-trolls-permanent-solution-trolling-290623