Trolling vs Harassment: Knowing the Difference

What Is Trolling?

Trolling is the act of posting deliberately provocative, off-topic, or inflammatory content online with the intention of provoking an emotional reaction. Internet trolls thrive on attention and disruption. Their goal is typically to derail conversations, annoy other users, or create chaos for entertainment.

Trolling exists on a spectrum. At the milder end, it might involve posting an obviously absurd opinion in a discussion thread to see who takes the bait. At the more severe end, trolling can involve targeted, repeated abuse directed at a specific individual or group.

What Is Online Harassment?

Online harassment is a pattern of behaviour directed at a specific person with the intent to intimidate, threaten, demean, or cause distress. Unlike casual trolling, harassment is personal, persistent, and often involves a power imbalance. It is not about provoking a reaction for amusement; it is about causing genuine harm to the target.

Harassment can take many forms, including threatening messages, sexual harassment, doxxing (publishing private information), coordinated abuse campaigns, and stalking behaviour. The defining characteristics are that it is targeted, repeated, and unwanted.

Where the Line Falls

The distinction between trolling and harassment is not always immediately obvious, but there are clear indicators that trolling has crossed into harassment territory:

• Targeting: General trolling is usually directed at a topic, a thread, or a community. Harassment is directed at a specific individual.
• Persistence: A troll may post one provocative comment and move on. A harasser continues to contact, mention, or target the same person repeatedly, especially after being asked or told to stop.
• Intent to harm: Trolling is typically motivated by boredom or a desire for attention. Harassment is motivated by a desire to cause fear, distress, or reputational damage.
• Escalation: If the behaviour escalates from annoying comments to threats, doxxing, or coordinated attacks, it has moved firmly into harassment.
• Impact on the target: If the behaviour is causing the target genuine distress, anxiety, or fear for their safety, it is harassment regardless of how the perpetrator characterises it.

UK Law and Online Behaviour

In the United Kingdom, several laws apply to online behaviour that crosses the line from annoying to criminal:

• The Communications Act 2003, Section 127: Makes it an offence to send messages that are grossly offensive, indecent, obscene, or menacing via a public electronic communications network.
• The Protection from Harassment Act 1997: Covers a course of conduct (two or more occasions) that amounts to harassment. This applies equally to online and offline behaviour.
• The Malicious Communications Act 1988: Makes it an offence to send communications that are indecent, grossly offensive, threatening, or contain information that is false and known to be false, if the purpose is to cause distress or anxiety.
• The Online Safety Act 2023: Introduced new duties for platforms to protect users from illegal content and content that is harmful to adults, with Ofcom as the regulator.

A common misconception is that freedom of expression protects all online speech. It does not. The right to free expression does not extend to threats, harassment, or speech designed to cause fear and distress.

How to Respond to Trolling

When you encounter a troll, the most effective response is usually no response at all. Trolls feed on attention and engagement. Practical steps include:

• Do not reply. The phrase "don't feed the trolls" exists for a reason.
• Use the platform's mute or block features to remove their content from your view.
• If the trolling is disruptive to a community you manage, remove the content and consider banning the user.

How to Respond to Harassment

If you are being harassed online, the response should be more structured:

1. Document everything with screenshots, including timestamps, usernames, and URLs.
2. Block the harasser on all platforms where they are contacting you.
3. Report the behaviour to the platform using its built-in reporting tools.
4. If the behaviour is threatening, persistent, or causing you to fear for your safety, report it to the police or to Action Fraud.
5. Talk to someone you trust about what you are experiencing.

Knowing the difference between a nuisance and a crime empowers you to respond proportionately. Trolls deserve to be ignored. Harassers deserve to be reported.