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  • According to results from the 2009 General Social Survey, about 7% of adult Internet users were cyber-bullied. This proportion was similar among males and females.

  • Certain people were more at risk of being bullied, including younger adults (those aged 18 to 24 years) (17%), those who were single (15%) and those who accessed social networking sites (11%).

  • About 4 in 10 (40%) adult Internet users who had been bullied were targeted by a stranger. Men were slightly more likely than women to be cyber-bullied by a stranger, at 46% of male victims versus 34% of female victims.

  • Slightly less than 1 in 10 adults (9%) reported cyber-bullying against at least one child in their household and 2% reported a case of child luring.  Most adults (71%) indicated that the child who had been cyber-bullied was female.

  • Relatively few incidents of cyber-bullying were reported to police. However, those that targeted children were more commonly reported than those that targeted adults (14% versus 7%).

  • About 4% of Canadians who used the Internet in the previous 12 months reported being the victim of bank fraud on the Internet.

  • Internet users living in census metropolitan areas were more likely than those living outside census metropolitan areas to report incidents of Internet bank fraud (4% compared to 2%).

  • The higher the personal income, the greater the risk of bank fraud on the Internet. Internet users with an annual income in excess of $60,000 were three times more likely to be the victims of Internet bank fraud than those earning less than $20,000 per year.

  • About 14% of Internet users who made online purchases in the 12 months preceding the survey encountered problems. These types of incidents most often involved not receiving goods or services that had already been paid for, receiving goods or services that were not as described on the website or having extra funds taken from their account.

  • Two-thirds (65%) of Internet users reported that their computer had been previously infected by a virus, spyware or adware. Another 4 in 10 Internet users (39%) indicated that they had experienced at least one phishing attempt.

  • One in 6 (16%) Internet users indicated that they had previously come across content that promoted hate or violence. Most of the time, this content targeted ethnic or religious groups.

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