Digital Trends just mentioned a story about a harassment lawsuit involving Facebook. A woman in the UK, who has been the subject of several reports of cyberbullying (of course, this is all “alleged”) has filed a lawsuit to force Facebook to give up the identities of those cyberbullies in question. The problem is, if Facebook gives in, what will this do with our privacy laws? It’s an intriguing situation, if a precedent of this nature is set.

The title of this post is “Brains vs Brawn”, but it could easily have been titled “how things change technologically but moral dilemmas don’t change at all.” Let’s take the central issue: cyberbullying. Is it different from bullying on the “playground”, say, 25 years ago? Well yes and no. The intention of bullies is to instill fear in their victims. A long time ago it used to be more physical than psychological. Those who engage in cyberbullying have the same mindset as that ruthless school bully: an intention to harm, be it physical or psychological. Internet exchanges are more psychological than physical, for obvious reasons. One big difference is that the Internet user is “disguised”, he can have many layers of security to protect the identification.

The “mantle” of the Internet can bring out the worst in people, including trolling. It is much more difficult to harass a person, in person, than to verbally abuse someone over the Internet. Most things would not be said in a realistic, real life situation. Harassment through the network is more like psychological warfare and many more people, with bad intentions, can get into the harassment. It has the potential to turn into a cyber-mafia situation. It could be argued that this has many more negative ramifications than the mere occurrence of a playground incident. The abuse can go on endlessly and has great potential for expansion. It is also much more difficult to monitor and / or catch.

So here we have this case where privacy laws will be able to protect cyber bullies and we ask what should Facebook do about it. On the playground, you fight or run away. Bullies often need to be confronted. But what to do about cyberbullying. Confrontation is virtually impossible at this point. Facebook doesn’t really have a legal obligation to provide the names of those identified as cyberbullies. However, it is necessary to stop this type of abuse.

As we read further in the news snippet, it appears that the UK will attempt to implement a monitoring system to deter would-be thugs from taking malicious action. It is quite a company. But what does this do for citizens who abide by Internet law? Should a few bad apples ruin the bunch? This doesn’t seem like the answer either.

Until some reasonable monitoring system comes into play, it’s clear what most victims of cyberbullying do: stay away from places where this could happen. Change your address on Facebook and start over. Don’t bite the hook. This is the Internet, after all. There are many baits.

On the other hand, if you are the victim of relentless cyberbullying, it may be time to seek out an attorney and file a lawsuit. But don’t expect Facebook to support you in any way. After all, they run a business and a service and it is their choice to participate in their business or not.