My social network stalker
Discussion
Did anyone else watch this? Just finished up on channel 4 now, about a girl who was stalked online by her boyfriend for 3 years.
Really twisted stuff, I will add a link to a news article below, but to summarise this guy was taking photos of his girlfriend naked and then posting them on the internet, sending them to people she knew, uploading them to adult websites etc, eventually causing an obsession to find and remove the pictures that took over her life. He blamed his friend for the leaks, saying he was being hacked.
Eventually, the girl involved was left a shell of her former self, crippled with obsessive compulsive disorder and anxiety - as she still is today. The downfall was when the sick pervert boyfriend emailed indecent images of the girl to her own father, who immediately recognised the email as not being from his daughter, and was able to track the email through the internet back to an online data storage space owned by the boyfriend, who was quickly arrested and admitted being behind the whole thing.
It was a really interesting program, mostly to see the way her family coped with it, her father in particular must be a man of incredible fortitude. If I was in his situation, I don't know if I'd have been able to hold back as he did, I think many would be the same.
In a final blow, the punishment, a pathetic 4 months in jail, of which the pervert only served two, seems absolutely pathetic for the amount of damage this man inflicted on his then-girlfriend's life, from which she will probably never completely recover. It really does seem astounding, that in this day and age, you can get harsher punishment for pushing someone over in the street than you can for manipulating someone's life to the point they develop lifelong illnesses as a result.
Really chilling viewing, made me think about a lot of things. If you missed it the first time around or had not heard the tale before (I had read about it, but this 70 minute program obviously goes into some depth) then I'd recommend you keep an eye out for it, it will no doubt be repeated plenty of times on More4 etc.
Really twisted stuff, I will add a link to a news article below, but to summarise this guy was taking photos of his girlfriend naked and then posting them on the internet, sending them to people she knew, uploading them to adult websites etc, eventually causing an obsession to find and remove the pictures that took over her life. He blamed his friend for the leaks, saying he was being hacked.
Eventually, the girl involved was left a shell of her former self, crippled with obsessive compulsive disorder and anxiety - as she still is today. The downfall was when the sick pervert boyfriend emailed indecent images of the girl to her own father, who immediately recognised the email as not being from his daughter, and was able to track the email through the internet back to an online data storage space owned by the boyfriend, who was quickly arrested and admitted being behind the whole thing.
It was a really interesting program, mostly to see the way her family coped with it, her father in particular must be a man of incredible fortitude. If I was in his situation, I don't know if I'd have been able to hold back as he did, I think many would be the same.
In a final blow, the punishment, a pathetic 4 months in jail, of which the pervert only served two, seems absolutely pathetic for the amount of damage this man inflicted on his then-girlfriend's life, from which she will probably never completely recover. It really does seem astounding, that in this day and age, you can get harsher punishment for pushing someone over in the street than you can for manipulating someone's life to the point they develop lifelong illnesses as a result.
Really chilling viewing, made me think about a lot of things. If you missed it the first time around or had not heard the tale before (I had read about it, but this 70 minute program obviously goes into some depth) then I'd recommend you keep an eye out for it, it will no doubt be repeated plenty of times on More4 etc.
There are some sick f
kers out there...
I was in a band & I left, along with another member because we couldn't get on with another guy. We put it down to a personality clash & moved on. Then, we discovered what can only be described as a prolonged personal vendetta against us which included threats by email, abuse on twitter, blog posts laying into us and derogatory youtube videos which identified us by name in the tags.
We ignored it & ignored it all the way up to the youtube vids, at which point we insisted youtube take them down, which they did.
Then it all went quiet for a while & once again, we moved on until we chanced on another blog post that amounted to libel & was a tissue of lies. Thoroughly fed up by now, we decided that sunlight is the best disinfectant, so we linked it on the (dead) band's facebook page & on ours as well, ensuring it got seen hundreds of times.
Within 24 hours, he removed it from his website & hasn't been heard of since.
The one & only crime on our part - and I understand you have to take me at my word here - was to leave a band because we didn't get on. The sheer intensity & sustained length of this campaign astounded me. I admit we did at one point consider involving the police, and even other methods...but I'm glad we found an effective way to deal with it.
We've subsequently witnessed him abusing strangers on Twitter, which lends credence to the idea that he's a fked in the head nutter. I'm just glad to be free of it. All I'm saying is if you're considering buying IT services in the south Hampshire area, size up the people you're dealing with before you shake hands....
kers out there...I was in a band & I left, along with another member because we couldn't get on with another guy. We put it down to a personality clash & moved on. Then, we discovered what can only be described as a prolonged personal vendetta against us which included threats by email, abuse on twitter, blog posts laying into us and derogatory youtube videos which identified us by name in the tags.
We ignored it & ignored it all the way up to the youtube vids, at which point we insisted youtube take them down, which they did.
Then it all went quiet for a while & once again, we moved on until we chanced on another blog post that amounted to libel & was a tissue of lies. Thoroughly fed up by now, we decided that sunlight is the best disinfectant, so we linked it on the (dead) band's facebook page & on ours as well, ensuring it got seen hundreds of times.
Within 24 hours, he removed it from his website & hasn't been heard of since.
The one & only crime on our part - and I understand you have to take me at my word here - was to leave a band because we didn't get on. The sheer intensity & sustained length of this campaign astounded me. I admit we did at one point consider involving the police, and even other methods...but I'm glad we found an effective way to deal with it.
We've subsequently witnessed him abusing strangers on Twitter, which lends credence to the idea that he's a f
ked in the head nutter. I'm just glad to be free of it. All I'm saying is if you're considering buying IT services in the south Hampshire area, size up the people you're dealing with before you shake hands....Although I haven't seen the program I am aware of the woman in question. She's obviously pretty stupid to have not realised it was her boyfriend years before it came to light. She can't be that affected by it if she's had the program made, where you see the pictures of her with stars over her nips and bush.
Strange programme.
When I saw the trailer I thought, oh another documentary about a sick internet whacko (4 tend to show them regularly, usually they involve an imaginary blonde hotty, this one was different).
And then it was also obvious who it was, there was no twist!
'Sunlight is the best disinfectant.' Sound advice.
When I saw the trailer I thought, oh another documentary about a sick internet whacko (4 tend to show them regularly, usually they involve an imaginary blonde hotty, this one was different).
And then it was also obvious who it was, there was no twist!
'Sunlight is the best disinfectant.' Sound advice.
2fast748 said:
I found the whole program slightly bizarre. Anyone with half a brain could tell it was him yet nobody seemed to put 2 and 2 together. The program was also mis-sold as having some sort of twist when it was plainly apparent who the culprit was from the outset.
Seeing as the advert for the programme said it was her boyfriend I dont think the programme was meant to be a guess who affair
nick s said:
Can everyone here who is outraged by his behaviour, honestly say that they haven't googled the pictures purely for a bit of "further reading"? 
Aha...http://www.tvtonight.co.uk/doc-of-the-day-my-socia...
Some great typos:
'her boyfriend was behind the viscous abuse...'
'You may find yourself gob-smacked by the young girl’s nativity...'
Halb said:
2fast748 said:
vescaegg said:
Seeing as the advert for the programme said it was her boyfriend I dont think the programme was meant to be a guess who affair
I was going off the info when I pressed the "i" button on my remote.A bizarre story all round. First, that nobody suspected the fat bloke despite there not being any other possible explanation for the photos keeping appearing. Secondly, that the girl apparently spent - and still spends - most of her time scouring websites to remove the photos yet is happy for them all to be shown repeatedly to an audience of six million people.
One part that sadly I didn't find unbelievable was the fat bloke's mate whom the police immediately assumed had committed the crimes without any investigation whatsoever. This also happened to a mate of mine whose brother invented a number of incidents - all complete lies - then went to the police and reported that my mate had hit him and threatened him. The police didn't even both asking my mate about these incidents and instead warned him to stop and stay away from his brother or else he would be arrested. Then they left and refused to discuss the case further, apart from with the brother who was advised to fit CCTV to his house and report any more incidents immediately.
One part that sadly I didn't find unbelievable was the fat bloke's mate whom the police immediately assumed had committed the crimes without any investigation whatsoever. This also happened to a mate of mine whose brother invented a number of incidents - all complete lies - then went to the police and reported that my mate had hit him and threatened him. The police didn't even both asking my mate about these incidents and instead warned him to stop and stay away from his brother or else he would be arrested. Then they left and refused to discuss the case further, apart from with the brother who was advised to fit CCTV to his house and report any more incidents immediately.
carmonk said:
A bizarre story all round. First, that nobody suspected the fat bloke despite there not being any other possible explanation for the photos keeping appearing. Secondly, that the girl apparently spent - and still spends - most of her time scouring websites to remove the photos yet is happy for them all to be shown repeatedly to an audience of six million people.
As mentioned above, sunlight is the best disinfectant. However, what you were shown were censored images, always covering the worst of it, and as mentioned in the program there were videos that were uploaded too. Even though a normal person could say "It's out there, get over it and move on", she has OCD now so it's not exactly her fault that it consumed or consumes her life so much, as her illness inhibits her ability to be rational about such things.As to her her being naive, indeed she was, but the first photos were taken when her boyfriend burst into the bathroom when she was in the bath and started taking them. She wanted them deleted but he kept them and the "hacking" story was at least plausible at this point. However, once they began to circulate across the web I think she became very fragile and vulnerable, and believed her boyfriend to be her only friend. While it might seem obvious from the outside, she was obviously easily coerced in her distressed state.
Interesting point also noted that the police were happy to slap a restraining order on the innocent bloke and treat him like a criminal despite not gathering or making any attempt to gather evidence. You could tell by the way he talked to the camera he was not a particularly articulate chap, they probably thought he was an easy target and they could slap a restraining order and put a lid on the case without making any attempt to solve the crime. Funny how it took and old bloke and his laptop to figure it all out eh?
Edited by Mastodon2 on Tuesday 21st February 17:07
swiftpete said:
Although I haven't seen the program I am aware of the woman in question. She's obviously pretty stupid to have not realised it was her boyfriend years before it came to light. She can't be that affected by it if she's had the program made, where you see the pictures of her with stars over her nips and bush.
The version I saw didn't have any stars covering her modesty. And yes, I did watch it on C4!Gassing Station | TV, Film, Streaming & Radio | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff