Real stories

At first, I didn’t know what was going on. Other kids at school were telling me I had said horrible things about them, but I hadn’t done anything.

It started one afternoon after lunch. A few of the girls who sit in front of me in maths began to whisper to each other, then they turned around and glared at me. They were secretly checking their phones under their desks and talking. I wasn’t sure what was going on.

When the bell went and we all got up to leave, one of the girls stopped to have a go at me: “So now I’m desperate for attention? That’s what you’ve been saying right?” I had no idea what she was talking about.

On the bus going home, I messaged my friend Claire to ask if she knew what was going on. She texted back a screenshot of an Instagram account that looked exactly like mine. There were all these posts with pictures of other girls from my school, each with nasty captions beneath them. It was crazy. I kept having to explain to my friends and other kids at school that it wasn’t me.

I couldn’t believe it – someone was pretending to be me online.

It was so humiliating. So many people were hurt by the fake comments, I felt really anxious about the future and what people thought of me. The first thing I did was report the account to Instagram. But it didn’t stop. Every time I reported a fake account, another one would appear within a day or so. And fake accounts using my name and profile pic were starting to pop up on other apps. It went on for weeks.

Eventually, a friend told me about eSafety. I made a cyberbullying complaint to eSafety who replied and provided me with support and help. They contacted the social media services and were able to get the fake accounts removed. It was such a relief. The fake accounts finally stopped. eSafety was really understanding and helped me get into contact with Kids Helpline to chat through how I was feeling. I’m really glad I was able to get the help I needed.

Being attacked at school was bad enough. When the video was sent around, I felt completely humiliated. With the help of eSafety, I was able to stop it from spreading further and got the support I needed.

One day, these older guys at school started picking a fight with me and my friend Tom. There were four of them. They were saying stuff to Tom like, ‘What are you doing hanging out with him?’ I told him to just ignore it and keep walking, but they followed us.

Then, out of nowhere, one of them grabbed Tom and held his arms behind his back. Two of them started hitting me. I tried to push them off, but they kept going until I fell. Then they kicked me and flicked dirt on me. I didn’t hit back – I’m really not like that, and I thought it would just make things worse.

Afterwards, I was bruised and sore. Tom was unhurt, but he was so upset that he hadn’t been able to help me. He told me one of them had filmed the whole thing on his phone. Later that week, the video was shared online and so many people from school saw it.

When I saw the footage, it made me feel sick. People in the comments were calling me embarrassing and pathetic.

Tom and I decided to show the video to a teacher. The teacher reported what had happened to the principal, and the guys involved in the fight were suspended. Anyone who had a copy of the video was asked to delete it, but it was still online for everyone to see.

With the help of the teacher, we made a report to eSafety. The eSafety team was really helpful and supportive. They asked for a copy of the video, a friend helped me collect as many URLs as possible and they were able to get it removed from all the platforms it was posted on. It was an awful experience, but I’m really grateful for the help of my friends, parents and eSafety.

Someone filmed me after I had too much to drink, and the video spread online with people making jokes and memes about me. Luckily, with the help of eSafety, I was able to get the help I needed.

It was my first time drinking alcohol. My friends and I were at a house party one Friday night, and while I thought I was pacing myself, things got out of hand. I don’t remember much of the night, just flashes of singing loudly, stumbling around, and my friends laughing.

The next morning, I woke up to a text from a friend: “I’m so sorry about the video. Hope you’re OK.” My stomach dropped. When I clicked the link, I saw myself lying in someone’s front yard, slurring my words, with the caption: “When you think you can handle your drinks but end up like this.” The video had thousands of views already across different social media platforms. People had reposted it with captions like: “Me after one vodka lemonade” and “Me after saying I don’t even feel it yet.”

At first, I tried to laugh it off. But as hours passed, I realised just how many people had seen it. What worried me the most was my family finding out. My parents are very conservative and are respected members of our local community. They would be so upset to learn I had drunk alcohol while underage, let alone see what had happened. When I told my parents they did seem disappointed, but they understood having a vulnerable moment captured and shared without consent was unfair. They focused on helping me get the content taken down.

I hoped it would blow over, but the situation got worse - even more copies of the video were being shared with different captions.

People at school were tagging me, making jokes, and people I didn’t even know were commenting. It was humiliating.

One of my friends told me that I could make a cyberbullying report to eSafety. I did, and eSafety contacted all the social media services where the video had been shared and made sure it was taken down. They also put me in contact with a counselling service to get support.

It was an embarrassing and stressful experience, and I hope no one else has to go through it. Having the support of eSafety was a great help throughout the entire incident.

I was scared when people who I thought were friends tried to get me to hurt myself. The messages were awful. Having the support of eSafety helped me stay safe.

I’m 13 and I love my dog and playing Minecraft with my friends. I have autism and Minecraft is a place that usually feels really safe and fun for me. Everyone had always been so friendly on Minecraft, until one day when I started chatting to someone I didn’t know. They started saying nasty things and calling me stupid. It was awful because it took away something that was important to me.

I blocked them like my dad told me to and I began chatting to other people. Some of these people also started being mean and they seemed to know a lot about me. They knew which school I went to and what I liked to do. They were saying that I was always by myself at school, and I had no friends.

It’s true, I like spending time by myself. There’s nothing wrong with that. But it was weird how much they seemed to know about me, like where I hung out at lunchtime and that I liked to take my dog Hudson for walks on the bush tracks near my house after school. I blocked these accounts too and decided not to chat to anyone on Minecraft anymore.

Then I started getting messages on different platforms. They were awful and they wouldn’t stop.

I’d block one account and a new message would appear from another account. They were calling me names. They were saying I should jump off a cliff. It made me feel really bad. That’s when I showed the messages to my dad.

He helped me to report what was happening to the different platforms. If a platform didn’t get back to us the next day, my dad helped me to report it to eSafety. They told me I did the right thing by reporting to the platform first. They also said it was really important to take screenshots of the things that were said to me, so they knew exactly which accounts were messaging me. eSafety then contacted the platforms, and the accounts that sent the mean messages were removed. eSafety also taught me how I can report bad behaviour directly to Minecraft.

I’m so glad the messages have stopped. Now I can enjoy playing Minecraft and taking Hudson my dog for walks.