"85 per cent of youth in Bangladesh said that online bullying is a serious problem", reveals Telenor Survey.
Grameenphone and Telenor Group, in association with Plan International, ran a survey in August and September 2021 among youth with covid-19 as the backdrop on how internet use and online bullying trends have changed across four countries Bangladesh, Malaysia, Pakistan and Thailand.
Of the 3,930 respondents in the recent regional survey, 16 per cent respondents were youths from Bangladesh.
The survey revealed that 85 per cent of these youth in Bangladesh said that online bullying is a severe problem.
29 per cent of Bangladesh youths said they were bullied before the pandemic, while 18 per cent said they experienced more online bullying since the onset of Covid-19.
In Bangladesh, 8 per cent of youths have experienced online bullying at least once a week or more since the pandemic.
The three most common platforms where youths experienced online bullying were social media, messaging apps, and online gaming and video game streaming platforms.
To stop the bullying online, respondents in the four countries said that they took several measures to safeguard themselves, which included ignoring the bully, which resulted in the person stopping, changing security settings online so the person could not contact them, and speaking to a parent or guardian about the problem.
Yasir Azman, CEO of Grameenphone, reiterated Grameenphone's focus to address the issues outlined by the Telenor survey, said, "We've been working hard to drive awareness and keep our future generations safe online in collaboration with Telenor and partners such as UNICEF to address these risks. There is no denying our future generation needs digital skills and are active users of the internet."
"We, therefore, need to intensify cooperation and commitment with various stakeholders to keep them safe. The survey results set a call to action to focus on this issue collectively. It is great to see the Bangladesh Government taking a bold step to include this very relevant subject in the National Curriculum with a mission to amplify awareness." he added.
"Awareness, training on online bullying, and digital building resilience are crucial to be a multi-stakeholder exercise. This should not be left just to educational institutions but should also involve parents and caregivers," said Manisha Dogra, VP, Sustainability for Telenor in Asia.
The survey also asked youths what they wanted as further guidance and training to protect themselves online.
Across the four countries, the results show that 56 per cent are keen to learn more about dealing with online bullying on social media apps, 46 per cent protecting their privacy online, and 43 per cent improving their mental health and wellbeing.
Additionally, 40 per cent of respondents were interested in protecting themselves from online bullies on messaging apps, and 37 per cent dealt with online bullying during gaming and streaming video games.
The survey also revealed that 86 per cent of youths surveyed in Bangladesh spent more time on the internet since Covid-19 began.
In addition, 35 per cent of youth in Bangladesh said they used the internet all the time, 15 per cent used it mainly in the evenings, and only 2 per cent limited their use to only during school hours.
