You may have at one time been bullied or harassed on social media or you may know someone who has undergone cyber bullying. Many victims do not know what to do when that happens so they suffer silently through that ill-treatment. Do not be one of those passive people.

Read on and find out three steps you can take as soon as anyone harasses or bullies you on social media:

Invoke Site Rules

Some social media sites like Facebook allow users to block someone who posts anything that you are not happy about, such as an abusive message. You can also report their post to the management of the site. When several such reports are made about that individual then his or her account may be shut down permanently. This will get you some relieve since that person will no longer be able to use that particular site to harass you.

Institute Criminal Proceedings

Some jurisdictions have laws barring people from misusing social media sites in order to bully or harass others. If such laws exist where you live, make a report to the police and that bully will be arrested and charged. However, some states do not have specific laws governing the use or misuse of social media so when you alert the authorities then charges may not be filed against that person.

In such a case, you may still register some relief since the bully may back off once they discover that you are not willing to take their harassment lying down.

Take Civil Action

Another option open to you is to open a civil suit against that cyber bully. This is possible even in places where there are no specific laws enacted to protect people against cybercrimes like bullying. Other existing laws can be used to hold that bully liable for their online actions. For instance, you can cite libel laws (laws against the publication of false information about someone or an entity) in order to take someone to court for writing falsehoods about you on social media.

Social media is a fairly new area of law in many jurisdictions so there may be no sufficient body of case law to base upon. Hire a lawyer to explore all the options open to you so that you take the path that offers the highest likelihood of ending the harassment and holding that offending person responsible for their actions.

Contact a company like Marino Law to learn more.