Imagine having your information put on a sex website by a disgruntled ex-employee. To make matters worse, e-mails start coming in from unknown, strange sources.
This sort of harassment is not uncommon, but the good news is that individuals are protected by the law.
Attorney Claire Waldeck explained a harrowing experience that one of her clients endured. It was with the help of the Protection from Harassment Act that the legal team was able to assist this helpless client.
“Our client started receiving disparaging, harassing e-mails from an unknown source. In addition, information was taken from the client’s website and a profile was opened on a sex site and she started receiving e-mails from people who believed that she was looking for sex on the Internet. Our client had the IP address, but could not trace where the e-mails were coming from,” said Waldeck.
She said she was able to help her client in a timely manner with assistance from the Protection from Harassment Act. She explained, “We were able to get a court order whereby Telkom was instructed to release information to us about who the IP addresses belonged to. This allowed us to serve a court order on the perpetrator, who happened to be a disgruntled ex-employee of our client who was using his father’s computer.”
Waldeck added that the Act provides a remedy in the form of protection, ‘which stops any individual from harassing another person’. This harassment may be severe, as in the aforementioned case, or it could involve the obstruction of a restraining order or even include abusive or threatening WhatsApp messages.
“You can apply for a protection order against the person who is harassing you at a Magistrates’ Court. In addition to the application for a protection order, you may also lodge a criminal complaint against the harasser if the harassing conduct amounts to an offence,” she added.
Although this Act cannot take away the psychological trauma that goes hand-in-hand with harassment, it is a quick and simple remedy that any resident can use in the event that he or she experiences this sort of harrowing predicament.
