Victim of Online Trolling? Here’s How You Can Fight Back & File a Complaint

As is the case with most unpatrolled networks, the World Wide Web can be quite a dark place – one wrong turn can lead you down the back alley where the muggers are lurking. As writers, we often encounter accounts that are not only finding faults with the work we do but also proceed to leave rather nasty comments on our work.

These trolls know no limits – while criticism of the piece is fair game, things do get personal at times. While most of these we ignore, some tend to leave a bad taste in the mouth.

And no one is immune to this. Anonymity can make the wimp feel like Hercules, who can even take on the powerful – even the External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was subjected to some rather nasty comments, which were not just offensive but were bordering on threats.

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Between 2014-16, the National Crime Records Bureau documented all such cases under a general category of cyber crimes and there were more than
33,531 cases of cyber attacks complaints. 

Here’s how you can file a complaint against online trolls.

To begin with, you need to identify the closest Cyber Crime Cell, and then, do the following:

• Draft a letter addressed to the chief of the Cyber Crime investigation cell. You could do this yourself or seek the help of a lawyer.
• Do remember to put down all the relevant details in this letter. Your name, contact details, and all the facts along with any evidence you have must be submitted.
• A copy of the offensive message, tweet, comment that you received must also be attached for the perusal of the department. Also, remember to furnish details of the account which left the message
• In case you are unable to locate a cyber cell branch near your place of residence, you can file an FIR in your local police station.

While ignoring the trolls might seem like the best option, one must report them to ensure that they are shut down before they wreck too much havoc.

(Edited by Shruti Singhal)

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