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The Stalker / Cyberstalker Thread

I am to boring to stalk :D So i safe
I've decide to stalk you...
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Profligate posting of personal images and data on the 'Net, combined with increasingly sophisticated app capabilities, make it easier for stalkers / cyberstalkers to locate their targets.
Arrested Japanese stalker used pupil image reflections

A man arrested on suspicion of stalking a female pop idol used the reflections of her pupils in photos she shared on social media and Google Street View to find where she lived.

Tokyo police declined comment on the specifics of the investigation but confirmed Friday that 26-year-old Hibiki Sato was arrested Sept. 17 on suspicion of indecent behavior in connection with stalking and causing injuries to the 20-year-old woman.

The police official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as is often policy at Japanese bureaucracies, said the case was related to the reports about a stalker and pupil images.

Police described Sato as an “avid fan.”

Public broadcaster NHK and other Japanese media reported this week that details in the woman’s selfies were used to identify the train station she frequented. They said Sato looked at other images she shared, such as her apartment, to figure out where she lived.

Police say he hurt her and committed indecent acts, such as groping her after accosting her from behind and knocking her down. ...

Tokyo Shimbun, a metropolitan daily, which reported on the stalking case, warned readers even casual selfies may show surrounding buildings that will allow people to identify the location of the photos.

It also said people shouldn’t make the V-sign with their hand, which Japanese often do in photos, because fingerprints could be stolen.

Cyberstalking has been a problem for years, with criminals and perpetrators of domestic violence using hacking, clandestine activation of microphones and cameras and other methods to track their victims.

It’s unclear how prevalent the use of high-resolution photos to locate potential victims might be.
SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/addc651762c6414a9d577f339e0b340b
 
Profligate posting of personal images and data on the 'Net, combined with increasingly sophisticated app capabilities, make it easier for stalkers / cyberstalkers to locate their targets.

SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/addc651762c6414a9d577f339e0b340b

I thought that working out locations from the reflections in someone's eye was something that only happened in the various CSI series. And the image enhancement sequence in Blade Runner, doesn't look so science fictional in this 2019.
 
Very long article:

Cyberstalking: tackling the 'faceless cowards'
Cyberstalking is a growing problem, but until now has not been recognised as a serious crime. Helen Pidd reports on the battle against the hidden menace online
The Guardian, Friday 24 September 2010 Article history

It was a moment Roland Reed had long dreaded. "Just Googled you, dad," began the text from his daughter. "Why are all these people saying horrible things about you online?" Reed stepped out of work, took a deep breath and dialled his daughter's number. As calmly as he could, he explained that he wasn't really a child abuser, but that someone on the internet had it in for him. A cyberstalker had chosen Reed as his victim, apparently at random. "I told her, 'It's just some nutter, ignore it,'" he says.

But Reed himself couldn't. Every night he logged on to the internet to see what his stalker had been doing to destroy his reputation that day. The allegations were spreading insidiously on internet forums, and he was powerless to stop them. Even if he did have time to contact each site moderator – where one existed – there was no point, he believed. His stalker, posting from behind an untraceable proxy server, would just create a new identity and spring up elsewhere. Plus, he didn't want this belligerent stranger to know that he cared. It would just feed their lust for attention and destruction.

Being accused of paedophilia is damaging for anyone, but for Reed, a 42-year-old youth worker, it was catastrophic. He had already warned his boss that someone had started a smear campaign against him, calling him a child molester on various message boards, and then adopting multiple personas to pile on to these forums and give the impression that lots of people agreed. Luckily, Reed's boss believed him. But what about anyone else who was bored enough to enter his name into a search engine? "Any time a work colleague gives me a strange look, I think, has he found this stuff about me on the internet?" says Reed, who is still being targeted to this day.


Or, as in Reed's case, the creation of an online smear campaign to blacken a victim's name.


I checked this out: googling on the search question "Roland Reed, molester? (apologies to Roland if he may read this) the third response that came up on the list (after hitting on Roland W Reed, American artist) was from a newspaper:

15 Feb 2004 - Dozens of child molesters convicted of the most heinous crimes on the youngest of victims are living within ... John Reed, 46, who got up to six years in prison in 1996 for sexually abusing an 8-year-old girl. ... Roland Costa, 29.

Now let's say somebody who was a bit sloppy, didn't read properly or was a bit hard of thinking didn't copy the names properly or conflated them as "Roland Reed". Paedo hunters have never come acrosss to me as being all that bright or discerning, anyway. When they're fired with righteous anger too... Toxic. then you go looking for Roland Reeds on the internet, find one, discover this sick pervert actually works in child care - and....
 
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Deep breath... copying over at least a link to a post I made elsewhere. Cutting and pasting the whole thing could be interpreted as spamming the forum ("multiple copies of the same post") so I just want to link to the post as it has value here. As far as I know I'm probably the only person on these forums who has ever been, in any applicable sense, a "stalker". What can I say? Bad time in my life, not terrifically proud it happened and it's a bad memory (from 1988-89, so a long time ago now). But people posting on this thread have asked what motivates people to stalk and what goes on in the head of a stalker. It may not even completely define me, as my behaviours at the time do not fit the classic profile and probably isn't typical of other stalkers: but this is what happened to me, and it might offer insights to others. I like to think I've grown up and stabilised a bit since!

First rushed draft of what could become a longer story - why I am having intense and often bad dreams about my old university. I've kept it simple and linear for now - there were other things going on too, but this is the gist
 
Thank you! I'd be lying if I were to say "the person I was thirty years ago is not the person I am now" - but that person is quite a lot of stops behind me on the railway line, so to speak. I find it hard to contemplate that the person I am now could fixate like that on a total stranger - alien to the person I am today - but somebody who shares a common life history with me did this, way back in 1988, and there are still echoes going on now. I offer the story partly as therapy and mainly in the hope it offers insight to people trying to understand this behaviour (if anyone with a genuine reason wanted to know more - any academic researcher, for instance - I'd be happy to go into more detail privately) and how something as abnormal as this can begin and take hold - and then slowly fade and die afterwards.

I still feel "constrained" as to what I can write to describe the situation, as to do this I'd be conclusively identifying at least one other person - (at least, potentially, to people around UEA at the time, and there are at least three people on this forum who would have been). I don't want to cause her upset or embarrasment, or for her to be shocked/scared at something resurfacing after three decades that is well past and in all probability something she's forgotten about... but at least an account of the situtation is out there!

And thank you for your support. Appreciated.
 
I think a lot of us look back on some of the things we did when we were younger and shudder, AgProv. I wasn't always the sane and sensible representation of humanity you now see in front of you...
 
I think a lot of us look back on some of the things we did when we were younger and shudder, AgProv. I wasn't always the sane and sensible representation of humanity you now see in front of you...

Too true, I cringe when I think of some of the things I did, and didn't do for that matter. Now I can see it was because I wasn't in my right mind, and I can take solace in the fact I never stalked or attacked or murdered anyone (hey, you take your comfort where you find it). It was largely socially tone deaf stuff I did, but you live and learn.
 
"socially tone-deaf stuff".... I like that! The whole story, if I ever fictionalise it as a novel (tempted., but foundering on the rock of implicating or identifying people who I have no right to further embarrass..) might be so tone-deaf as to have a hint of Beethoven!
 
This cyberstalker's particularly aggressive campaign garnered him a 4-year prison sentence ...
Cyberstalker gets 4 years in prison for ‘war’ on woman

Less than two months after their office romance ended, Ahmad Kazzelbach began tampering with the email and social media accounts of the Baltimore woman who broke up with him. He changed her Instagram username to include the word “whore.”

That was only the start of a vicious cyberstalking campaign that would escalate steadily over the next year. Before FBI agents arrested her ex-boyfriend, the woman was wrongfully arrested twice and spent four nights in jail based on a string of false police reports that he made.

Kazzelbach, 27, of Pasadena, Maryland, was sentenced on Monday to four years in prison for his online harassment of the woman, who is identified by her initials “J.K.” in court records. ...

FULL STORY: https://apnews.com/3b9cb690e8880c700870f75ca4b14c51
 
This is mad.

Amanda was terrorised by a stalker for two years.
Then she learned her husband was to blame.


In December 2015, Amanda Playle – a mum of three girls from East Sussex – received a Facebook friend request from a man named Anthony Reynolds, a man she had once dated in high school.

The two began talking, but when Anthony suggested they meet up for a drink, Amanda decided to cease all contact with her ex.

Two weeks later, Anthony got back in touch with Amanda, and his messages had become more sinister, branding her a cheater and telling her she was unfit to be a mother.

“It was really vile,” Amanda told ITV’s This Morning.

Despite unfriending Anthony, he was still able to contact her through her friends’ pages. And every time she deactivated her Facebook account, it was somehow always re-activated and Anthony was able to message her once again.


Continued to the bonkers conclusion:
https://www.mamamia.com.au/amanda-playle-stalked-by-husband/
 
Around 2000 I bumped into an old school classmate, we swapped numbers and she started sending me text messages.
It was light hearted at first but it became apparent that she was having a rough time at home and was prone to odd mood swings.

I was sitting at work one day when I received a call on my work phone, it was her, asking why I hadn't replied to any texts recently, this was back in the days when phones only held 10 texts and she was sending about 20 a day.
I hadn't actually told her where I worked and I told her I didn't have time to text all day because I was busy.
She told me I wasn't as she'd been watching me all morning, I looked outside and there she was, parked in my works car park.

In the following weeks I tried being sympathetic and asked her to keep her distance but it didn't work.
She told me it wasn't her, she said Arab Spies had cloned her phone and were out to ruin her life.
Her texts became more and more manic.
It was sad to see her decline, I didn't want to hurt her feelings but I had no other option.
I had to be really blunt to get her to leave me alone.

I found out that she was still following me on social media a couple of years ago but I'm glad to say that she appears to have moved away, and hasn't tried to contact me since.
 
This is mad.

Amanda was terrorised by a stalker for two years.
Then she learned her husband was to blame.


In December 2015, Amanda Playle – a mum of three girls from East Sussex – received a Facebook friend request from a man named Anthony Reynolds, a man she had once dated in high school.

The two began talking, but when Anthony suggested they meet up for a drink, Amanda decided to cease all contact with her ex.

Two weeks later, Anthony got back in touch with Amanda, and his messages had become more sinister, branding her a cheater and telling her she was unfit to be a mother.

“It was really vile,” Amanda told ITV’s This Morning.

Despite unfriending Anthony, he was still able to contact her through her friends’ pages. And every time she deactivated her Facebook account, it was somehow always re-activated and Anthony was able to message her once again.


Continued to the bonkers conclusion:
https://www.mamamia.com.au/amanda-playle-stalked-by-husband/

Playle is an old family name in my dad's family. I've never ever come across it before - and now I do it's some stalky-nutter husband! Typical.
 
Further back in this thread there is an account of some nasty stalking by someone with a distinctive name. Googlng it brings up someone of the same name, in the same area, with their own business.

You'd be thinking I'll be sure to pay my bill on time! :worry:
 
These former (now fired) eBay employees waged a major cyberstalking and harassment campaign against a Massachusetts couple who'd been critical of their company.
eBay workers who sent spiders to couple to plead guilty

Four former eBay Inc. employees have agreed to plead guilty to their roles in a campaign of intimidation that included sending live spiders and cockroaches to the home of a Massachusetts couple who ran an online newsletter critical of the auction site, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. ...

They are among seven former eBay employees charged in the case, in which the Massachusetts couple had other disturbing items sent to their home, including a funeral wreath and a bloody pig Halloween mask.

They are all charged with conspiracy to commit cyberstalking and conspiracy to tamper with a witness. Their lawyers either declined to comment or didn’t immediately return emails seeking comment Wednesday.

The employees also sent pornographic magazines with the husband’s name on them to their neighbor’s house, planned to break into the couple’s garage to install a GPS device on their car, and posted the couple’s names and address online, advertising things like yard sales and encouraging strangers to knock on the door if the pair wasn’t outside, officials said.

The suspects engaged in a “systematic campaign fueled by the resources of a Fortune 500 company to emotionally and psychologically terrorize this middle-aged couple in Natick,” U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling said at a news conference when charges were announced in June. ...

FULL STORY: https://apnews.com/75aeac91a075e949dba806bcfceea4cf
 
Sweat: Sylwia (Magdalena Kolesnik) is a Fitness Trainer and Instagram Influencer. While she does suffer from the attention of a real life and online stalker/creep some of her colleagues aren't much better. Her family, in particular her mother, don't realise how real online harassment can become. The constant pressure of trying to smile all the time - a sponsor is concerned when Sylwia cries on a vid - takes it out of her. Even when going upstairs she posts selfie vids. Sylwia is not a victim though, neither is she a narcissist. A very human film with great performances from Magdalena and her dog, Jackson. Written & Directed by Magnus von Horn. 8/10.

In Cinemas.
 
I was reading an article in the paper about stalking, specifically women who are stalked, and how the reaction they got from people they told ranged from dismissive to "you should be flattered" - and some of this response was from police!

It also accused popular culture of normalising the romantic pursuit narrative, and used the cult movie Say Anything as an example, as it increasingly is. I really like that film, and it doesn't come across as enabling to the stalker-style controlling personality because John Cusack is too mild-mannered, but now I wonder if a stalker watching it would identify with him.

The stalking cases I read about from real life are not much like Say Anything, though, it's a fantasy. I've been stalked, and it's not anything like that. Basically, I want to still be able to enjoy Say Anything.
 
:oldm:




Until they get to the revenge stage, that's how they self identify.

Yeah, it was in the article this self-imagined myth of the "good guy" (or girl) doing the right thing for the right outcome, but it never is the right outcome because they're being terrifying. It's just that I never see Say Anything mentioned in stalker cases in the news!
 
It's just that I never see Say Anything mentioned in stalker cases in the news!

Take the win while it's there :) Sounds like a result to me!
 
Attempted Reagan assassin John Hinckley Jr. to play NYC concert
NEW YORK - John Hinckley Jr., the man who tried to assassinate President Ronald Reagan to impress actress Jodi Foster will be playing a concert in New York City this summer.

This is revolting. They spelled Jodie Foster's name wrong!

Seriously, I don't know how I feel about this. I believe in rehabilitation and a freed person's right to make a living, but it's still creepy.

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/john-hinckley-jr-nyc-concert
 
I don't know which is creepier, Hinckley performing a concert or the audience who would think that's a great night out. Isn't he fairly rich (from his family)?
 
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