Cyberbullying in America Today
Locked On Investigations, LLC was contracted by a family who were victims of cyberbullying. Their statements and evidence were collected, but it did not assist investigators as much as they had hoped. It was a considerable learning experience discovering not only the actions that are legally classified as cyberbullying but the depth in which it occurs and surprisingly the effects of it.
I have submitted my “Statement of Probable Cause” along with my evaluation and notes on this matter. It is under formal investigation and as an active investigation, some facts can not be disclosed at this time. However, due to the gravity of the situation and safety factors I felt compelled to expose all that I could in hopes that each American will do their due diligence to protect their children, family, and loved ones from this predatory scheme.
What is cyberbullying?
The United States Department of Health and Human Services, who established the website https://stopbullying.gov primarily identifies the acts that can occur through SMS, Text, apps, or online social media, forums, or gaming platforms where people can view, participate in, or share content. Cyberbullying includes sending, posting, or sharing negative, harmful, false, or mean content about someone else. It can include sharing personal or private information about someone else causing embarrassment or humiliation.
The most common methods used to cyberbully an individual would include, but not be limited to:
1. Social: Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and/or TikTok (another company owned by China, where Montana, is
currently the only state to have signed legislation into law that would ban TikTok. Others are following as more
Chinese platforms are used to target American citizens).
2. Phone/Tablets: Text messaging and massaging apps.
3. Internet: Instant Messaging (IM), Direct Messaging (DM), and/or Online Chatting platforms on the internet,
such as Kik, Discord, Line, and others.
4. Message Boards: Forums, Chat Rooms, and Message Boards, such as Reddit.
5. Email (nothing is sacred).
6. Online Gaming Communities (the focus of my investigation).
Cyberbulling really only has 5 elements to it. 1) It occurs on a digital platform connected to the Internet, 2) It is Persistent, 3) It is Permanent (as permanent as anything can be in a digital age), 4) It is Hard To Notice, and 5) It is ultimately a method of controlling another.
Which gaming platform is permitting this?
It is important to clearly and definitively state that my investigation, examined the practices of 1 of the Gaming Platforms. The investigation into their conduct is still pending and they should be viewed as “innocent until proven guilty”, a fundamental right that all Americans get to enjoy while the rest of the world, may not. At this time, IM30 is not guilty of any crime, a thorough and in depth investigation performed by Law Enforcement pursuant to a formal request by Unites States Congress, will present their findings to the legislatures, who will direct law and policy accordingly and within the bounds of the laws established by the US Constitution.
IM30 is an online games and mobile games developer headquartered in Haidian, Beijing, China and employees between 11-50 developers. The Director of Global Marketing for IM30 is Sunny Huang, the Executive Assistant to CEO is Xiao Gao, and the CEO is Yang Lan; who through Chinese Media and Sinovation Ventures, invested the $3,000,000.00 Yen to establish IM30. These are listed as Private Companies only because they are not publicly traded on the Stock Market because they are controlled and owned by the Chinese Government. On October 17, 2022 three journalists for the New York Times wrote that under Mr. Xi’s leadership, China is returning to its roots: a state-controlled economy that demands business conform to the aims of the Chinese Communist Party.
As IM30, like TikTok, is owned and controlled by the Chinese government, they do not adhere to US Laws. In the Terms of Service, Section 25 states, “…any action related thereto will be governed by the laws of People’s Republic of China, without regard to its conflict of laws provisions. …Any disputes arising from or in connection with these Terms shall be submitted to China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (“CIETAC”)…”. This makes it extremely difficult for an American citizen to receive any form of justice, which is why legislatures are addressing this concern through legislation efforts.
How is cyberbullying happening?
I personally do not join these games, as the money paid in for improvements, simply feed and fund the Communist Party of China, which is a philosophy that is counter to the American way of life and what I defended as a veteran of the US Army.
In the game Last Fortress: Underground players will create their little world called a “Fortress”. During game play they can join an “Alliance” in order to work collaboratively to achieve tasks too great for an individual to accomplish on their own. This teaches some relatively good social skills for usage in the “real world”.
However, it is when an Alliance, “uses cheats, exploits, hacks, bots, mods, or third-party software designed to gain an advantage, perceived or actual, over other Members, or modify or interfere with the Service”, that member is in direct violation of the IM30 Terms of Service, Section 16, item q. There is a “perceived” advantage when a member is able to have 20,000,000 in “CP” Combat Power, while another person has only 6,000,000 “CP”, in relatively the same amount of time. This is like a College Student beating up on a 6th Grader. The 6th Grader has no chance, it isn’t even remotely a fair fight. This is clearly a display of bullying.
Myself, what I found funny about the justifications used by the “Bullys” was, “this is a war game”, yes, but it isn’t war. My personal experience with war, we had “Rules of Engagement”, during Basic Training I was instructed on The Warsaw Pact, The Geneva Convention, and UCMJ or Uniformed Code of Military Justice on how I will deal with the enemy and engage with the enemy, so even in war, there are rules. The people I witnessed being abusive, who themselves were veterans was an eye-opener. I am absolutely certain, they did not receive any high level training.
I will admit, after I had enough evidence to support my “Probable Cause Statement”, I needed to see how organized this one alliance was, who were their agents, which alliance were they connected with, if any ,and I needed that information to be on the server, simultaneously with the primary target to show to connection. I went on to World Chat, this is an inner game service to allow you to communicate with all members playing within your map. During my game play, server 525 (my assigned server) and 526 were both playing on the same map. 526 had several alliances that were equal to and below the alliance I was a member of, yet 526 had an alliance that was at over 1.3 Billion CP, while the alliance I was a member of, was at less than 500,000,000 CP. We had more CP than anyone on 525 Server, but we were tied with 5 other alliances from 525. While I was in World Chat, I asked that the alliance from 526 please cease the attacks, we are diminished and unable to recover. I was ridiculed and mocked for being, “a cry baby” and “weak”. I returned the banter with vulgarity and disparaging remarks and I was not disappointed. The one alliance began their attack on my alliance, additionally, 3 other alliances joined in to repeatedly zero each member of the alliance I was a member of. This is important because the tactic used by the 526 alliance placed pressure on my leadership, a US Army Veteran. I do not know this to be accurate, but I have no reason to doubt his service. However, this is an adult, a veteran who was forced, due to the harassment by the 526 Alliance to remove me from their alliance. Imagine the mental and emotional trauma placed upon a 14 year old child who played this game. He accessed it through Facebook, linked it to his Facebook account, and played. However, due to his age and lack of knowledge in many things, he was quickly assessed as a weaker element and targeted. Everyday his fortress was zeroed. Everyday he was unable to fully enjoy and participate in a war strategy game believed by many to be a social game that can teach team building skills. Everyday, he was ridiculed and mocked. His suicide was devastating, which is why I took this investigation.
Today, we really don’t understand the mentality of the NAZI, however, this game shows it in it’s fullest. The Germans, a great people who followed and permitted atrocities of unspeakable horror to be committed against a people. They stood in the streets and waived their banners rather than address the wrong.
It is easy to go with the crowd and even to encourage conduct that is harmful when filled with emotion. It is also easy to say, “its just a game”. You are trying to say you are not responsible for harming someone, but it was you that repeatedly attacked the player, it was you that isolated that player out. With so many elements to the game, Last Fortress, zeroing out a player repeatedly is not necessary for your game play to be fun, unless you are intentionally trying to be mean to another human being.
What happens now?
The big issue is that China does not respect the laws of the United States, but in fairness, the United States doesn’t live our lives by their laws either. Additionally, any judgement gained in an American Court will hold little to no validation to a member of the Chinese Communist Party. Therefore, the United States House of Representatives has initiated a committee to determine what course of action is necessary given the fact that IM30 is not properly facilitating their services. A number of Representatives and Senators wish to block companies such as Chinese Media, TikTok, and IM30 from providing services to US citizens. The issue is Freedom of Speech is a right enjoyed by Americans, but does not apply to Chinese companies operating from China and holding no physical presence in the US for a means of recourse for US citizens.
Additionally, a crisis that is building which has the US in a difficult position is China and Taiwan. Taiwan is declaring itself to be a free state and China sees it as a province of China under Chinese rule. Xi Jingping, the Ruler of China, has indicated that the use of military force to control Taiwan was entirely possible. President Biden has stated that if China send troops to Taiwan, the US will get involved and protect the Taiwanese citizens. This can fracture US relations with China and Russia, which is already fragile.
With 16% of all US citizens engaged in online gaming and IM30 having ownership of 3 popular games, if the US were to declare that China’s lack of good stewardship placed US citizens at too great a risk to participate in Chinese gaming services, it would be a significant financial loss for China. They have created a format where Americans simply spend a lot of money for entertainment and losing that revenue could be the greatest sanction the legislature could possibly do to a country that exercises no oversight.
What do I recommend?
May own personal opinion on this is just don’t play it. You have no protections. They “Doxie” your account, look online you will see numerous questions about regaining an account that was stolen from you. That is your financial information, personal identifiers, and so much more that is now out in the world.
I do not believe anyone under 18 should be playing this game, with so many predators playing. A lot of the players are people who spent most of their school years being bullied and now they are in a forum where they can’t get touched, so they are the bully. I would not let anyone I care about be exposed to such conduct.
If you are going to engage in online gaming activity you owe it to yourself and your loved ones to set up barriers. 1. Open a bank account at a bank you don’t bank out. Deposit a set amount of money. Pay for all transactions with that debit card, that way if it is breached they have nothing, close the account, and move on. 2. Create a Facebook Account with no real connection to your existence. Graduate from a different High School, hold a job with a large corporation, so the employee file is better protected. A lot of times with smaller companies, you can call and say, “yes my name is Irwin R Scheister and I am looking for Jake Player” and they will call them over the intercom or forward you to their desk…now the bad guy knows where you work. 3. With editors and translators being what they are, say you are from another country with another language and just copy and paste all transactions. Keep responses short so you don’t give up the fact that you really don’t live there and lack certain phraseology that they would use.
More importantly, do not support and fund the Chinese Communist Party. The United Nations Human Rights Council, Amnesty International, and the Council on Foreign Relations have received repeated allegations of physical and sexual abuse and harassment, unfair trials, detention in internment camps for political dissidence, coercive population control methods, forced labor violations (especially child labor), torture, mass surveillance, family separation, and repression of cultural and religious expression (Tibet). Having served in Special Forces I have a hard mindset against tyranny and oppressive regimes. I cannot in good conscience support the Chinese Communist Party and by spending money on any IM30 game, I would be funding their campaign of terror against their citizens. I know I will be supporting any legislation to make their platforms illegal and I will be joining in petitioning Facebook to stop supporting a company owned by a Government that engages in violating Human Rights. Stay Safe America.