CYBER-STALKER PROFILES Vengeance, Delusional, and Obsessive Cyber-Stalkers
power, control, and the need to get even
Vengeance or vengeful cyber-stalkers become angry with their victims over some imaginary slight. They become obsessed with gaining control over their victims,
and engage in a relentless online campaign of harassment, slander, terror, and destruction. Some of these vengeance stalkers are psychopaths, that is, people without conscience or remorse. Almost all vengeance cyber-stalkers have a experienced some form of childhood abuse or low self-esteem, which is marked by its hate and fear of parental authority. This follows them into adulthood and often manifests in the form of drug and alcohol abuse, failed marriages, and the inability
to sustain healthy, personal relationships.
Vengeance cyber-stalkers adopt a stalker philosophy that allows them to justify any and all actions that they may take to harm their victim. Some are delusional, often paranoid, and falsely believe that they are the victims of some wrong done to them by the person they are stalking. They all stalk to get even, and their cyberstalking agenda can quickly move from online terror to physical violence if they can find their victims off line … and most vengeance cyber-stalkers try to locate their victims off the net. The vengeance cyber-stalker is on a vendetta against his victim, and the only relief the victim can expect is through an authoritative intervention on behalf of the victim. A vengeance stalker usually has other mental problems driving them, which cross over into other cyber-stalker territory like delusion and obsession.
terrorism and fear
Most cyber-stalkers work behind an e-mail mask of anonymity, carrying on their cyber-stalking campaign from the dark and shadowy side of the net. By definition, they become personal terrorists dedicated to causing distress and fear in their victims. The crime of cyber-stalking is about power and control over their victim. Cyber-stalkers raise their own self-esteem by attacking their victim's integrity, reputation, and personal safety boundaries. The more damage they can do to their victims, whether psychological or physical, the better the cyberstalker feels. Because of this "feel good" aspect of the crime, a cyber-stalker is compelled to continue cyber-stalking until they are stopped by an outside incentive or force.
obsession turns to vengeance
Not all cyber-stalkers are shadow people who are unknown to their victims.
Very often the most dangerous vengeance cyber-stalkers are known by their
victims, usually impersonally through a public mailing list or chat room. Unknown
to the victim, this type of vengeance cyber-stalker appears benign, friendly, and even helpful at first as the stalker works his way into his victim's confidence. It's at this stage that the cyber-stalker is developing his own unhealthy mental attachment to his victim, as he hides his growing obsession with, and delusions about, his victim. The victim has no way of knowing that the person they know, over the internet, is actually a time bomb waiting to go off. Most vengeance cyber-stalkers are men who stalk women. Their initial desire to raise their self-esteem, through association with their victim, feeds the cyber-stalker's mental states of delusion and obsession. The stalker may also harbor secret romantic feelings toward his victim, which also factor into his delusions. It's only a matter of time before the mental state of the cyber-stalker pushes him over the edge, and the imaginary slight occurs. Once the cyber-stalker believes himself slighted by the object of his obsession and delusion, the state of his mental illness intensifies and escalates into the vengeance cyber-stalker.
the known vengeance cyber-stalker
Unlike anonymous cyber-stalker terrorists, who wage a direct assault campaign through e-mail, the known vengeance cyber-stalker prefers to wage his terrorist campaign through third party entities. He rarely, if ever, directly communicates with his victim. Instead, he prefers to either launch his attacks in public internet forums, or launch a stealth terrorist campaign in which he targets … for destruction … his victim's real world life, work, reputation, and well-being. All cyber-stalkers are cowards. But the actions of the known vengeance stalker make him the ultimate coward of all cyber-stalkers.
manipulating third parties to harrass victims
The known vengeance cyber-stalker is usually a male who works with computers, and has developed skills in internet technology. He usually has a job title that appears responsible or even prestigious, and he can come across as being educated, knowledgeable, articulate, and an upstanding citizen. He uses his job position, and computer skills, to manipulate third parties into waging his war against his victim. His plan often entails contacting the victim's work associates, friends, and government authorities where he lodges a complaint about the victim as he plays the role of the good Samaritan. He is a master manipulator who is skilled in the art of character assassination, and has the ability to convince his unwitting third party contacts that his victim is an untrustworthy person who does not deserve their respect. He will create a false and misleading profile of his victim, in order to launch investigations into his victim's personal and business background. Not only does he want these third parties to harass, harm, and penalize his victim, but he also seeks … through them … whatever off line information he can gather on his victim for the purpose of physically escalating his vengeance stalking. Too often, this cyber-stalking strategy has been successful and has lead to the murder of the victim.
When a known vengeance cyber-stalker manages to fool a third party entity into waging his vengeance campaign against his victim, the unsuspecting third party often works with the cyber stalker in investigating his victim. For a vengeance cyber-stalker, that is a reinforcement of his delusions and an act of control over his victim that he could never have achieved on his own. The vengeance cyber-stalker can now engage in, by approval of an authority, what is actually a cyber-crime … the stalking of his victim. And the third party becomes, without it's consent or knowledge, a party to the cyber-stalking of the victim. This entire manipulated activity only acts to empower the stalker to continue with his cyber-criminal behavior.
When a third party attack does occur, the victim rarely knows about the covert activity until the damage has been done. Once realized, it is in the victim's best interest to engage in active damage control or the cyber-stalker attacks will only escalate through other third party harassment. In fact, the vengeance cyber-stalker will actually use the authority of one unwitting third party to pull another third party authority into his vengeance campaign, as he builds his delusional case against his victim. It would have been much simpler and healthier, for the victim, if the third party had been educated about cyber-stalkers and had "redolent" protocols to recognize the profile of a vengeance stalker. Had this protocol been in place, the third party would have quickly discovered that the complainer was, in fact, cyber stalking the person they were complaining about. These protocols already exist and have been successfully used by many law enforcement agencies.
damage control
Once a third party entity has been notified that they were unwittingly manipulated into helping a cyber-stalker harass and terrorize his victim, it's very important that the third party take immediate and aggressive action. While each case must be reviewed individually, a successful method of stopping cyber-stalkers is to put a spot light on their activity. Having the third party admonish the cyber-stalker for making them a party to his vengeance is an important first step. No decent, moral, or ethical person or group would want to be used, by a vengeance cyber-stalker, to stalk or harm another person. It's an affront to their own sense of right and justice. The third party must be open and willing to up their own learning curve on cyber-stalking and cyber-crime, and not take a defensive stance when the victim turns to them for help. No victim of cyber-stalking should ever confront their cyber-stalker. Not only is it futile, but it only acts to further fuel the cyber-stalker's campaign.
Since the cyber-stalker is driven by having control over their victim, it is necessary
to take that control away by an authority and force greater than the victim's. When the admonishment comes from the authority or power that the stalker sought to ally with, the tables are turned on the cyber-stalker who now finds himself to be the object of scrutiny. Remember, cyber-stalkers are cowards and only pursue their stalker behavior when they feel they won't get caught. They can only be successful when they think they can fool people into playing their vengeance game. But once the cyber-stalker discovers that his strategy is no longer effective, and that he is the one now under scrutiny, his cyber-stalking activity will stop. Along with admonishing the cyberstalker, the third party should follow through by contacting the server that the cyber-stalker used in his terrorist campaign. If the cyber-stalker used a computer at work, then his employers should be notified of his behavior and that the cyber-stalking was done using their resources. And if the cyber-stalker works at a computer job, informing his employers of his activity is imperative. Cyber-stalkers rarely have only one victim, and removing the cyber-stalker from the computer resource is a major step in rescuing cyber-victims not yet uncovered.
doing the right thing
Vengeance cyber-stalking is a calculated, systematic, and malicious crime against the innocent. It is pure Net Evil. Cyber-crime education is the first line of defense against becoming a victim of a cyber-stalker, whether you're an individual or a group. But when that line of defense isn't strong enough to protect the innocent from a cyber-stalker, then good people must do the right thing … in the name of justice, compassion, and human decency … and take on that cyber-stalker at ground zero. Those who turn their backs on a victim, even denying the very existence of the cyber-stalking crime, are themselves part of the problem.
To learn more about other cyber-stalker profiles, protection against cyber-stalkers, cyber-stalker laws, cyber-stalker help, and cyber-stalking law enforcement protocols and cyber-crime, please make use of our Net Rangers Worldwide Resource Links.