MTV's new show 'Webbed' to be around cyber crime

Today advanced technology is making lives easier for us but on the flip side has also become a source of concern due to misuse by unscrupulous elements.

The internet is no doubt a great place to make friends but a better place for faceless predators. Every Like, Share, Comment, Tweet has a butterfly effect. It has the power to change someone's life in a microsecond. A certain Miss Shetty found this out the hard way. Like millions of other girls of her age, she also innocently uploaded her picture on a popular networking site. Some boys started harassing her by posting photo-shopped nude pictures of her. Traumatized, she went into depression and became suicidal. What was her mistake…just that she was the victim of cyber abuse like many others sailing in the same boat.

There's only one way to bring order to this chaos -- Awareness. Taking an initiative of arming the youth with awareness against cyber abuse, MTV ACT under MTV, the leading youth iconic brand, in association with the NGO, Cyber Crime Awareness Society (CCAS) brings MTV Webbed –Cyber Abuse - real stories, a new drama series that every youth will relate to! The show will feature a series of fictional representations of real life cases and incidents that the youth encounter on the web. This show is backed by MTV’s own pro social platform MTV ACT that engages with over 20+NGOs and independent organizations to support cause based initiatives across verticals. Starting September 14, 2013, Saturday at 7pm, ‘MTV WEBBED’ targets the youth between the age group of 15 to 24 years.

In conversation with Adgully about the new show, Aditya Swamy, EVP and Business Head, MTV India said, “The theme in itself stands ahead. Looking at the growing rates of cyber crime we thought of doing something in terms of spreading awareness about the show. MTV as a brand is known for spreading word about what is happening around in the world in terms of issues the youth is facing these days and with this show again our thought is to showcase the growing cyber crime in our country.”

“Looking at the growing evolvement of youth with regards to social media, we thought let’s go ahead and take a step, get into the eyes and ears of people and guide them in terms of what they should do to avoid getting trapped in the entire cyber crime fiasco. The stories revolve around the fact of how youngsters get trapped and become a part of cyber crime. The idea is to bring awareness about cyber crime. Hence for that we have partnered with Cyber Crime association too and a couple of days back we also had a prime time discussion on news channel, CNN IBN,” he added.

Swamy sharing the statistics says, “Today 85 percent of the people connect to social media everyday and out of those just a very small number of people think twice before uploading their stuff on social media websites and 45 percent of people have agreed to the fact that they have received something weird in the form of a spam. Also 47 percent of people say that they have received some kind of strange request from strangers on facebook and also shockingly 25 percent of people agreed that the photos that they have put up on facebook have been misused in some way or the other. I believe these are large numbers and it is high time that we take a step and help to protect them from all this.”  

With new cases coming to light each day, cyber abuse is no longer a matter that can be swept under the carpet. Survey indicates that in recent times, cyber abuse has grown exponentially with each passing year and shows no signs of slowing down. In 2012 47.9 percent cyber forgery and 39.1 percent cyber fraud was reported under IPC category for cyber crimes.  Under IT Act, 49.2 percent cases of hacking with computer systems and 32.6 cases of obscene publication/transmission in electronic form were the main cases.

A ten part series, MTV WEBBED will have youth icons. From television heartthrobs like Jay Bhanushali, Siddharth Shukla, Karan Vir Bohra, Ritwick Dhanjani, to choreographer Salman Khan, to the beauties Pratyusha Banerjee, Sana Syed, Priya Wal and singer Chang will be featuring in this show. Each will host an episode and will emphasize the natural instinct of youth who let curiosity take the better of them only to regret it later and face the brutal consequences.

In terms of choosing hosts, Swamy said, “Since the show connects to youth hence we have chosen our hosts accordingly. We wanted to keep a strong connect and hence we have taken all the young hosts in our show who are born in the digital era and they know what the youngsters are going through.”

In terms of marketing Swamy told us that the approach is Multi-media ranging from television to going to various colleges and spreading a word. “A lot of ads are visible across our channel. There will also be a lot of facebook activities and apps that we have come up with,” he added.

Milind Agarwal, President, CCAS said, “We have seen an increase in the rates of cyber crimes hence with a thought to spread awareness we thought of this show. This show will act as a medium for us to reach out to the numerous victims of cyber abuse. Also MTV enjoys a huge fan following amongst today’s youth and hence this was the perfect platform for us to reach out to all the teenagers who are already facing this problem or those who may face it in the future.”

With tips to prevent cyber abuse now MTV along with CCAS will spread awareness and educate the youth about the correct safety measures. The time has come to raise questions and give them a clear understanding of how their digital entitles can be abused and taken advantage of without necessary precautions. This can be achieved only with the co-operation of the youth who are prone to abuse on the digital media platform. Thus by bringing to screen real life instances, MTV Webbed will be an eye opener and help to prevent further cyber abuse.