Legal Aspects Of School Cyberbullying

In the school environment, we sometimes attend many situations of the so-called bullying or bullying. But there is much more, especially in a world where social networks and the digital world are present every day. What is cyberbullying at school?

Cyberbullying is a reality that, unfortunately, many boys and girls live in the world today. This form of violence is becoming more and more frequent and has very negative effects on their well-being and development. In addition, it violates their fundamental rights and causes emotional and psychological damage to the victims and their families.

However, school cyberbullying has often not been sufficiently addressed by public policies or recognized in all its seriousness by the corresponding institutions.

This problem must be approached from many areas.  Legal, psychological, educational, family, media… Next, we will analyze some legal aspects of school cyberbullying.

What is cyberbullying at school?

Cyberbullying is a particular form of bullying. It is about peer violence that occurs in the cyber social context. It also has to do with the social relationships generated in school life. There are some forms of violence that are linked to school cyberbullying, such as discrimination, homophobia and repression, among others.

This situation has been defined as a conduct of psychological persecution of one student against another. The stalker chooses his victim and makes repeated attacks.  It is a negative and deliberate action that the victim cannot get out of on their own.

To be considered as such, school cyberbullying requires that there is a situation of unequal power between the bully and his victim. This inequality can be physical, psychological or social. There must also be a clear intention to cause harm, along with the repetition and permanence of this type of aggression over time.

Differences between bullying and cyberbullying

It is true that cyberbullying shares many characteristics with bullying. However, its peculiarity is that the aggressors use new technologies to humiliate, intimidate, harass or threaten their victims. The main ones are social networks, SMS, email, blogs …

The damages caused by this type of harassment are also different, since in cyberbullying there is a violation of privacy. This occurs mainly through the dissemination of compromising videos or photos without the consent of the victim.

Another characteristic of this type of bullying is that the number of bystanders is much higher than traditional bullying. In addition, cyberbullying is not limited to the school environment, but persecutes the victim at all times and places.

From a legal point of view, both bullying and cyberbullying constitute a violation of the fundamental rights of minors. These two types of violence cause enormous psychological damage to the victims and their families.

At times, the consequences have been fatal, since the harassment has ended in the suicide of the minors. However, despite the seriousness of the situation, in Spain, neither bullying nor cyberbullying are classified in the Penal Code.

Bullying is not classified in the Penal Code

At the time of issuing convictions for cases of bullying or cyberbullying, the Courts and Tribunals are forced to apply different types of penalties existing in the Penal Code.

These loopholes occur because the Penal Code does not provide a criminal type for such cases. Depending on the situation and the intensity of the harassment, we can indeed find ourselves in the presence of various types of crimes.

In extreme cases, such as when school cyberbullying ends in the suicide of the victim, the criminal type that could be applied is that of a “Crime of homicide or murder” or a “Crime of induction to suicide”.

Threats and coercion are very common in school cyberbullying situations. In these cases, the “Crime of threats and coercion” or the “Crime of harassment or harassment” can be applied. The “Crime against moral integrity” is also applicable in many cases.

In the event that there are intimate photos or videos of the victim that the harasser has disseminated without their consent, the following may apply:

• “Crime against the privacy of the minor”.
• “Crime of possession of child pornography.”
• Most cases of cyberbullying can also be sentenced by applying the “Crime of slander and libel”.