Gamers are increasingly reporting incidents of online harassment, which is a growing issue

Harassment is a familiar term that has been prevalent across generations. Both women and men have reported experiencing various forms of harassment, including physical, mental, and verbal abuse, among others. Regrettably, it is not uncommon for individuals to have experienced harassment at some point in their lives. With the advent of technology and its integration into our daily lives, harassment has found a new avenue through the online gaming community. Unfortunately, throughout time, harassment has constantly increased.

According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), there is a high probability that you or someone close to you has encountered hate speech or harassment inside gaming communities considering the widespread nature of online gaming.

Based on the study, conducted by the “Casino EN Ligne” a Canadian based French online gambling company. There has been an upward trend in the number of people who have ever reported experiencing any form of harassment. It was 74% in 2019; in 2020, it increased to 81%; to 83% in 2021; and to 86% in 2022. In addition, the research found that 77% of respondents said they had endured serious harassment.

Engaging in the use of derogatory language, being the target of trolling or griefing, experiencing discrimination, feeling self-conscious, dealing with persistent harassment, receiving physical threats, being stalked, experiencing sexual harassment, and being doxed or swatted are just a few examples of the many different types of harassment listed in the report. Unfortunately, the prevalence of some forms of harassment is rising.

These results underline the urgent need to confront and resolve the harassment problem in online gaming groups.

The representative for Casinos En Ligne emphasizes that there is a serious issue with harassment and hate crimes in the online gambling industry. A warning should be sent to both game companies and the gaming community given the rate at which instances like doxxing and swatting are on the rise. The ADL defines “doxing” as the public disclosure of personally identifying information, whereas “swatting” refers to the falsely reporting of an emergency in order to target a specific person.

Furthermore, research addresses the issue of identity harassment and especially covers the games with the highest percentage of harassment events.

The ADL reports that a startling 44% and 47% spike in harassment, respectively, has been recorded by female gamers and gamers who identify as African Americans. Furthermore, between 2019 and 2022, there was a 55% rise in abuse directed towards Jewish online multiplayer players. These figures demonstrate the alarming increase in harassment directed towards particular gaming populations.

Lastly, Based on the percentage of reported harassment events, a list of the online games with the greatest percentage of reported harassment events is also provided by the survey. With an astounding 86% of recorded events, Counter Strike leads the list, closely followed by Valorant (84%). League of Legends and PUBG: Battlegrounds both have high rates of harassment, 83% and 81%, respectively. 80% of recorded occurrences are from Call of Duty, which completes the list.

These figures show how common harassment is in these well-known online games, highlighting the urgent need for action to address and lessen these problems.

Read next: Bot Traffic on the Internet Reaches Record Breaking 47.4%
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World