Kids Safety
Bullying has many faces and it can be more than insults and mocking in public. When Alice started receiving anonymous threats on WhatsApp, she got so scared that she didn’t even dare tell her parents about it. However, the cyberbullies did have an identity and in the end Alice found out who they were.
My story
Talking to my friends is the most important thing in my life. WhatsApp is my favourite app. You can text all the time for free and even send picture messages that automatically save to your photo album on your phone. How cool is that?
One day I got a really weird message from a blocked number. I didn’t even know you could message someone on WhatsApp anonymously. The cyberbully was telling me that they were going to get me when I least expected it and that I’m “in big trouble”. The bully also said that if I told anyone about the messages my punishment would be even worse than what’s coming to me.
I was so scared. I didn’t want to tell anyone in case the cyberbully did something horrible to me. The messages continued to come but after a week I realized that this person wasn’t going to do anything to me apart from send harassing messages.
I showed my older brother and he convinced me to tell our parents and they reported it to the police. Luckily they were able to track down the IP address the messages were coming from. I was so happy when I found out that this person would never be able to hurt me or send threatening or abusive messages again. My parents bought me a new SIM card so I could get a new number. Now I make sure that only close people have my number and can contact me. I’ve learned how to protect myself against this happening again..
