Understanding cyberbullying as an information security attack—life cycle modeling

Nowadays, cyberbullying cases are more common due to free access to technological resources. Studies related to this phenomenon from the fields of computer science and computer security are still limited. Several factors such as the access to specific databases on cyberbullying, the unification of scientific criteria that assess the nature of the problem, or the absence of real proposals that prevent and mitigate this problem could motivate the lack of interest by researchers in the field of information security to generate significant contributions. This research proposes a cyberbullying life cycle model through topic modeling and conceptualizes the different stages of the attack considering criteria associated with computer attacks. This proposal is supported by a review of the specific literature and knowledge bases gained from experiences of victims of online harassment and tweets from attackers.