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The Game of Thrones star has had hateful and derogatory comments slung her way online ever since she began starring as plucky Stark daughter Arya in the hit HBO drama as a 12-year-old.
“I’ve been sat on a train right next to my mum with my phone in my hand reading all sorts of abuse,” the actress who is now 17 tells RadioTimes.com. “I felt completely on my own.”
Williams now avoids sites that are liable to post unpleasant comments but drew on her experiences for her latest role: a teenage girl targeted by an online suicide troll in Channel 4's chilling new drama Cyberbully.
All of this means that she is in a pretty good position to offer advice about how people young and old should conduct themselves online.
Here’s what she told us:
Know who your friends are…
Not online: I am talking about the real people you have in your living room: your mum, your dad, your friends. There is always someone there who is looking out for you. There may be times when you feel completely alone and isolated. At the end of the day, if you just switch it off there is always someone there and loads of helplines and all sorts in the real world – not online, not in this cyber world – that can help you.
Parents should get involved…
Parents are a bit scared of this cyberworld. I don’t want to sound rude but the internet is really, really young. I had Facebook when I was 12, which was too young. I’ve grown up on the internet. I couldn’t imagine life without it with it. I remember seeing an encyclopaedia and thinking "why would you not just use Wiki?" I think it’s parents' duty to stop being so technophobic. This is the world we are living in and they should try to embrace that.
Don’t be afraid to block…
I’ve found blocking accounts works. And when you report things, they get dealt with very quickly in my experience – the same day usually. A lot of people say "ignore it" but instead they should use their block or try to get these accounts suspended. I’m one girl: I’m never going to clean the whole internet up but if I do [something about] the people who are trolling me or who I see troll someone else, that is something.
Show some manners…
People on Twitter say I’m crazy for trying to teach manners on the internet. I sit there and think: "Why is it crazy? You’re just a person behind a computer screen like I am." People have assumed this "it’s just the internet, isn’t it?’ [attitude] and take a back-seat role. I think we should do something about it.
Appreciate what the internet has to offer…
I grew up very quickly on the internet. I’ve had really s**t times on the internet and still do today. But it doesn’t tarnish my view of it and I still think it can be a great place. There are a few people who don’t treat it right and they get all the attention and all the news stories, when actually there is so much more going on.
You can connect with so many different people from all around the world. We like to make out that strangers on the internet are unsafe but that’s just because of what the headlines say. My cousin has a lot of very close friends that he met on the internet and has never met in real life – and he is so connected to these people. We’ve only met such a small chunk of what’s out there. That’s always portrayed as such a bad thing, and in some cases that is very scary – but it’s not all bad.
Cyberbully is on Channel 4 on Thursday January 15th at 9pm
The 17-year-old actress says that filming the one-off Channel 4 drama in which her character comes under the gaze of a suicide troll was her toughest assignment to date
Maisie Williams says that filming her latest role as a victim of cyberbullying was even tougher than playing the beleaguered Arya Stark in Game of Thrones.
The 17-year-old actress, whose character in the fantasy drama has experienced more than her fair share of suffering over the past four series, plays a teenage girl called Casey who is targeted by an online suicide troll in Cyberbully.
“It is the most intense shoot I have ever been a part of – it was eight days, it felt like about a year,” she told RadioTimes.com. "But in a very good way – a very tough way.
“It was even more demanding in a way than Game of Thrones. There I am, a small part of a huge production whereas this time I was the main part of the production. It was daunting, I was very nervous."
She added that Cyberbully – which is filmed entirely in her character's bedroom – hinged on very small moments.
“It was amazing how little things became so intense. When I waited, say, for a reply from the cyberbully it had the tension of a big explosion or a horse chase or a sword fight. And there was none of that in this. But here something really small that happens, a sound in the room, becomes huge."
Williams prepared for her new role by watching the box set of Buried, the film in which Ryan Reynolds' truck driver Paul Conroy finds himself buried alive in a wooden coffin.
"It was kind of what we had to do, but we had a whole room to play with, which was nicer...”
The actress admits she also had some personal experience of being bullied online to draw on.
“I’ve been sat on a train right next to my mum with my phone in my hand and reading all sorts of abuse,” she said. “I felt completely on my own.”
And she said it was Cyberbully’s authentic treatment of online issues affecting the young that her attracted her to it.
“When I read the script it was something I could completely relate to and it was done in a way that wasn’t patronising to the younger generation. I’m sick of programmes that use all this text language – friends texting each other with BFF in a way they never would– and the way this played on that. In fact, this was used against our cyberbully, our hacker [when he uses terms no teenager would use].
"I just thought it was a very current subject and something I feel passionately about.”
Cyberbully airs on Channel 4 on Thursday 15th January at 9pm
