It began with an innocuous comment on Facebook defending a teenage X Factor contestant who was on the receiving end of a torrent of hate online.
What followed for Nicola Brookes was 10 years of hell as she became a target of faceless trolls who hid behind the anonymity allowed by social media to spew their poisonous lies, labelling her a drug dealer and paedophile.
The post that triggered the abuse was about 18-year-old X Factor contestant Frankie Cocozza, who she felt compelled to defend when she saw the “vitriol and abuse” he was getting.
Nicole said: “This was also motivated by the suicide of my daughter’s 15-year-old friend in 2007. "She had been abused, both on and offline, by school pupils targeting her and my own daughter.” What is
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