Azeria and Antisnatchor: Responses to a Cyberbully on Twitter
During a meeting of information security (infosec) experts, Antisnatchor attacked Azeria for tweeting photos of attendees. Azeria, Antisnatchor, and other members of the Twitter infosec community became embroiled in increasingly charged exchanges. Some labeled Antisnatchor a cyberbully. Others responded with misogynistic insults, attempts to sabotage careers, and threats of physical harm. These actions seem to fail to produce the harm that their instigators intended. Both Azeria and Antisnatchor ended 2020 with professional successes. Still, important questions remained unanswered. How had Azeria responded to Antisnatchor? What kind of example did she set for the community? Did some members go too far with their responses? How should Azeria and others respond differently to incidents like this?
1. Apply the retributive and restorative justice perspectives to understand an online community’s responses to a harasser and a victim of harassment.
2. Assess the doxing of an online harasser using utilitarian and deontological ethical perspectives.
3. Assess campaigns to get others to stop following someone online using utilitarian and deontological ethical perspectives.
4. Evaluate the responses of an individual who has experienced online harassment using the virtue ethics perspective.
5. Evaluate the responses of an individual who has experienced online harassment using a care ethics perspective.
6. Develop recommendations for alternative ways in which someone who has experienced online harassment can respond in the future.