Cyberbullying is all too common in Canada. One in five boys and one in three girls report being involved in cyberbullying. Name-calling, taunts or threats using a cell phone, email or posted on the Internet. These figures rank Canada as one of the worst in the world for cyberbullying, with higher rates than the U.S.

To see him today, you'd never guess David Knight was a bullying victim. The 23-year-old university graduate is working towards his goal of becoming a Canadian Forces fighter pilot. A few years ago though, Knight was forced to finish his last year of high school at home because he had become the victim of a vicious online bullying campaign that left him socially isolated and feeling utterly humiliated.

Knight tells W-FIVE's Sandie Rinaldo: "They had taken my picture, posted it on the top of this website and underneath it they had put, 'Welcome to the website that makes fun of Dave Knight ... sign the guestbook and tell him what you really think of him." The guest book had comments like: "Stop using date rape on little boys and then taking them in the back of your car..." and "You are an ugly gay loser who has no life/friends."

Still at school, attending classes or walking through the cafeteria felt like a minefield for Knight, who didn't know who in his peer group was attacking him in cyberspace. "Is it the quiet, shy girl sitting next to you in class? Is it the sports player at the front of the class? Is it the guy who you know is beating you up already? You don't know where it comes from," explains Knight.

Wendy Craig, a psychologist who studies the effects of online bullying in her 'Bully Lab' at Queens University in Kingston, Ont. says the anonymity of cyberbullying is ten times more punishing than any physical assault in a hallway. "I think that element of the unknown adds even more terror," says Craig.

Social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace are common places for kids to bully online. Tiana Barbaza-Cousineau, a 14-year-old teen, experienced it firsthand. She was already suffering depression and was using Facebook as a way to reach out to her friends and peers. In response, she was bullied through a Facebook application called the Honesty Box. It's a place where users can post anonymous comments to others in their social network. Barbaza-Cousineau's Facebook 'friends' wrote: "You're a slut, you're a whore, you're fat, you don't deserve to be alive. Just stop talking already...no one wants to hear you," she recalls, giving a sampling of the sorts of comments received.

Barbaza-Cousineau says the bullying made her start to hate herself and that she wanted to talk to W-FIVE in hopes of sharing her story to help other young victims of cyberbullying.

Victims like 14 year-old Dawn-Marie Wesley, of Mission, B.C., who was the victim of a lengthy bullying campaign that started at school and online and finally ended with a lethal cellphone call (researchers include phone calls in their definition of cyberbulling.)

"Dawn-Marie you're f***ing dead," taunted Wesley's bully, pushing her over the edge. Home alone and terrified, she penned a note to her family explaining that she couldn't face her bullies any longer. Wesley wrote, "They're always looking for a new person to beat up and these are the toughest girls. If I ratted, I would get them kicked out of school and then there is nothing stopping them." Then using her dog's leash, she hanged herself.

Police charged three girls with harassing and uttering threats, making them the first kids to be charged in a bullying case. Two of the three girls were convicted, the other acquitted.

Ontario Provincial Police Const. Robyn MacEachern knows just how serious online bullying can be. She travels from school to school explaining to kids that there can be serious consequences to cyberbullying. "If I say to your face, 'I'm going to kill you' or if I say it online it's the same thing. It's a criminal offence," she tells a group of school kids.

In Knight's case, his family ended up suing their son's school board after their failed attempts to get help from the school and police to intervene and put a stop to their son's tormentors. They say they don't want money, just an acknowledgement and an apology. They also threatened legal action against the Internet service provider that hosted the site called, "Welcome to the site that makes fun of David Knight" after several requests that the site be taken down for good were ignored.

W-FIVE asked Kathleen Wynne, Ontario's minister of education, about the province's new law aimed at stopping bullying online and outside school property. "What we've done in the legislation is we've provided for behaviours that happen off school property but have an impact on school climate," she tells Rinaldo. Under the new regulations, schools can suspend bullies for up to 21 days.

The rules may be tough, but today's new cyber social clubs call for a little more adult intervention. "We can't give our kids a world where there's no adult supervision and there's no help for them," says MacEachern.