From CBC News–With children having spent more time on mobile devices, tablets and computers at home for both academic and non-academic pursuits, there has been a 37 per cent increase in the overall online victimization of youth, according to the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, which operates cybertip.ca.
The agency says predators have become more persistent and aggressive, employing tactics that range from repeated unsolicited sexual images to doxing — publicly identifying or publishing private information, especially as a form of punishment or revenge.
“Contacting kids from multiple accounts, even when the kids try to disconnect and stop contact, threatening kids with doxing them and that would mean revealing all of their personal information making it available online for everybody, humiliating them,” said Noni Classen, the director of education at the Canadian Centre for Child Protection in Winnipeg.
As part of Safer Internet Day on Tuesday, Classen is urging parents to become more informed and to understand the risks their children might face online. She thinks it’s difficult to attribute the rise to anything specific.
“With everything that’s been going on through the pandemic, we have more kids online longer, as well as maybe they don’t have the same level of supervision all the time,” Classen said. “Kids online are having to deal with the aggressive nature of individuals who are targeting them in a way that we haven’t seen before.”