When a person gives out a lot of their personal information to strangers or makes it public on MSM platforms, they put themselves at risk of being a victim of sexual harassment. If a stranger identifies the target victim and can collect information such as their phone number, the exact area where they live or similar information from their friends, then they are given the opportunity to work out a harassment scenario against the victim. Each medium provides ways to be able to protect against such phenomena. In this context, there is the report function, so that the medium can be informed that there is a violation of the rules it sets, and impose the resulting consequences, and can even monitor the progress of its request (support requests). Another protection mechanism is the block, where the other person is no longer able to communicate with you. In any case, however, the security measures should be respected by the settings of each medium, in order to prevent any attempt of harassment. For example, the creation of a private (private) account, so that the account is only visible to those who have accepted it as followers. Instagram has a lot of information on this topic at the following link and a brochure specifically for parents at this link, although it is not translated into Greek. The above, does not mean that we should not be tense about our active safety. Because media settings are effective if we know how to apply some basic rules on our own. For example, we shouldn’t accept uncritical friend requests, or based on their potentially misleading profile picture. Conversely, we should not make friendship requests to strangers based solely on their appearance. We are not sure that a boy is actually a boy at the age he claims to be, etc. Care needs to be taken to remove from our friends accounts that are not active and we do not know and in the real world. To avoid misunderstandings, for those we really feel bad, we can inform them with a message that for security reasons their account should be removed and that we can reconnect in the future. In general, Social Networks, have started to develop specialized features to protect young people, such as that an adult, who has been reported by teens or blocked multiple times by teens, cannot search for teens by name or make a friend request. However, knowledge and recognition of specific patterns of behaviour is essential for effective protection against cyberbullying. One of the techniques used by perpetrators is blackmail. When the conversation progresses they will ask for a simple photo, and will psychologically push for more provocative ones. If the victim gives in, they will move on to the next stage. If not, they will blackmail that they will send the previous photos to friends, classmates or parents. So by asking for small favors each time, the victim doesn’t understand how exposed and vulnerable they are to blackmail.
