One out of 20 teens report they have been sexually extorted online, according to new research out of UW-Eau Claire. Sexual extortion, or “sextortion,” occurs when a victim who voluntarily shares sexual images finds themself threatened with the release of those materials unless they meet the blackmailer’s demands — many of which are sexual. The U.S. Federal Justice department identified sextortion as the fastest growing form of online bullying among children and teens. Dr. Justin Patchin, the UW-Eau Claire researcher behind this study, surveyed of 5,500 middle and high school students nationwide and found that 5 percent of the teens he surveyed had experienced sextortion. “Five percent isn’t a huge number but it’s still a lot of young people and so it’s something we can’t ignore,” Patchin said. “Most often what we hear are the threats are made to post the images online or send the images to classmates…
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Nurses are struggling with cyberbullying by patients and families, a new study has found. Massey University PhD graduate Dr Natalia D’Souza wrote her thesis on workplace cyberbullying and found that nurses are not only bullied by other staff, but also by patients and their families. Dr D’Souza says patient care responsibilities make it difficult for nurses to block communication if they are being bullied by electronic channels. “I was told about one case where a nurse was being bullied by a patient’s mother, and she used her son to gain access. “She would call to ask for help for her son, but then start abusing the nurse, so the nurse was hesitant to block the calls in case it was a genuine emergency.” Many nurses were also concerned about how being cyberbullied on social media would affect their professional reputation. “Sometimes their personal contact details have been posted online,…