100
Why People Attack
Each Other Online
Your reputation is constantly at risk from malicious attack by
people you know—and even from complete strangers. Every day,
thousands of innocent victims find that they have been smeared, slan-
dered, and dragged through the mud online by one or more attack-
ers. The motives for these attacks vary widely, ranging from petty
jealousy to sociopathy. But these attacks have one thing in common:
they often leave an indelible mark on the victim’s search results.
Most people are subject to few malicious online attacks, but you
still need to be on guard against them. It is necessary to take pre-
cautions now because malicious reputation attacks create some of
the most severe, pernicious, and persistent forms of reputation dam-
age. Even if you have not yet been a victim of a malicious attack, it
is important to understand the motivations of online attackers so
that you know how to prepare yourself in case of the worst. By anal-
CHAPTER
101Why People Attack Each Other Online
ogy, prudent drivers wear their seatbelts every time they get in the
car, even though they hope to avoid accidents. And, as described in
Chapter 11, starting your preparation now can help prevent and
minimize the damage caused by an online attack; if you have care-
fully bolstered your online profile and carefully monitor your online
reputation for changes, an attacker will find it very difficult to cause
major damage.
This chapter provides insight into the types of people that
might launch an online reputation attack against you. If you are the
victim of an anonymous online attack, this chapter may help identify
who is behind it and how the person can be convinced to stop or re-
tract the attack.
There Have Always Been Attacks on Reputation
Malicious gossip, rumor, and slander are as old as human society.
Ancient texts are filled with stories of whispered conversations and
false allegations. To take just one example, in the Christian Bible,
Paul the Apostle uses people who spread gossip and lies as an exam-
ple of the evil that can infect humankind: “They are gossips, slan-
derers, God-haters, haughty, arrogant, boastful, . . . faithless,
heartless, ruthless.”
1
The apostle Timothy similarly condemns “gos-
sips and busybodies” who “[say] things they ought not to.”
2
Recorded
examples of gossip go back even further in history; the ancient Greek
leader Pericles, who ruled Athens from 461 B.C. to 421 B.C., was not
immune from public whispering. A popular rumor of the time alleged
that he was always depicted wearing a helmet in order to hide his de-
formed skull.
3
If gossip and slander are common in the offline world, then it
should come as no surprise that they are also common online.
Turning on a computer, sadly, does not replace negative emotions
with positive ones. Nor do people instantly magically become angelic
when they go online. If anything, many people who are polite face-to-
102 Wild West 2.0
face become more aggressive and harsh online. See Chapter 5 for an
explanation of how anonymity can empower ill will.
There can be no complete list of motives for online attacks. Any
attempt to list every possible reason why humans maliciously attack
each other would necessarily be incomplete; every day, people find
new reasons to do horrible things. But there are some common cat-
egories that explain the vast majority of malicious Internet reputa-
tion damage. Among them are jealousy, envy, revenge, bullying,
vigilante enforcement of social norms, politics, business and greed,
extortion, social gossip, and sociopathy.
The Usual Suspects: Jealousy,
Envy, and Revenge
Three of the most common negative human emotions are the cause
of many online reputation attacks. There are no reliable statistics
about the motivations behind online attackers—nor is there likely to
ever be a comprehensive study—but it is a safe bet that more than
half of online smear campaigns against private individuals start with
one of the “big three” motivations: jealousy, envy, and revenge.
Jealousy
Beware, my lord, of jealousy; it is the green-eyed
monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on.
—IAGO IN SHAKESPEARE’S OTHELLO
Jealousy is the feeling of insecurity that comes with a fear of losing
something. It is most strongly associated with the feelings of insecure
lovers, who constantly worry that their loved one will leave them for
another. Jealousy of this form is closely related to (but still distinct
from) envy, which is the emotion felt by someone who desires what
somebody else has.
103Why People Attack Each Other Online
Jealousy has always been a source of human drama. It is Shake-
speare’s “green eyed-monster,”
4
the “magnifier of trifles,”
5
“the jaundice
of the soul,”
6
and even “that dragon which slays love under the pre-
tence of keeping it alive.”
7
Jealousy has motivated lovers to massively
destructive acts and has spurred slander and lies for generations.
As far as online reputation goes, jealousy is a particularly dan-
gerous motivation. Jealousy robs the mind of logic and replaces it
with blind passion. A jealous attacker will stop at nothing to protect
what he thinks is his, even if it means destroying what he intended to
protect.
If you are faced with a jealous attacker, your best bet may be to
avoid confrontation and work to play defense while the jealous at-
tacker’s emotions play out. Many (but not all) attacks that start with
jealousy end within a few weeks when the attacker’s emotions run
their course.
Envy
Envy shoots at others and wounds itself.
—PROVERB
Envy is a desire for that which somebody else has. It is often associ-
ated with feelings of unfairness or rivalry. Just like jealousy, it has a
long pedigree. Envy has always been considered one of the “seven
deadly sins.” The vice of envy was considered so serious that the poet
Dante, during the Middle Ages, wrote in his famous Divine Comedy
that the punishment in the afterlife for envy was for the envious to
have their eyes sewn shut with wire, so that they could no longer see
what others possess.
8
Countless modern examples abound; the clas-
sic tale of Snow White—famously collected by the Brothers Grimm
and later popularized by Disney—revolves around Snow White’s
stepmother’s envy of Snow White’s beauty. Advertisements for fancy
cars and other luxury goods play on our feelings of envy toward what
others have. And, of course, the 2004 film Envy revolved around one
character’s envy of another’s business success.
104 Wild West 2.0
Envy is such a powerful emotion that it often causes people to try
to destroy somebody else rather than attempt to improve themselves.
An envious attacker will often use defamation and slander in an at-
tempt to bring down her victim. In the pre-Internet era, this was of-
ten through whispered lies and rumors; today, it can take the form of
full-fledged online barrages with permanent consequences.
An envious attacker is often snide and subtle. The duration of the
attack depends on the nature of the envy: Is the attacker upset about
one particular event (your winning an award or being recognized by a
leader) or about your status generally (being a supervisor, being the
straight-A student, or living in a nicer neighborhood)? If the attacker
is upset about a particular event, her envy will usually blow over pretty
quickly; play defense for a week and then you can go on the counter-
attack. But, if the attacker is upset about a more permanent condition,
then you can expect a constant volley of small attacks until something
else distracts the attacker weeks or even months later. In that case, you
will want to get ahead of the attacks by building Google walls (de-
scribed in Chapter 11) to help slow the spread of your attacker’s mes-
sages. It may also be worth trying to work out the situation offline by
befriending and being kind to the attacker; envy is an emotion that
sometimes can be overcome by friendship if you are gentle and invite
the attacker to participate in the benefits of which she is envious.
Revenge
Those who plot the destruction of others
often perish in the attempt.
—THOMAS MORE
Revenge is a desire to get even or get back at somebody for a per-
ceived wrong. It is an attempt to make somebody else feel pain as a
form of punishment or comeuppance. It is often closely related to
jealousy or envy, in that those two emotions can lead to a desire to
take revenge on somebody else for a perceived success or the person’s
wrongful acts.
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