Guest editorial overview: “dark side of online communities”

Online Communities have been growing with increasing intervention of social media. The digital natives have also gradually started to spend a fairly large time on the internet and their contributions have grown significantly in shaping discussions and future of online communities. With an increase in contribution, it is also witnessed that these communities have also been responsible for promoting cyberbullying; trolling; fake news; discriminant; harassment and many more such pressing issues. While studies have focused on each of these important issues, their lies a dearth of contributions from the academicians and practitioners that would extend the debate on the theoretical and practical side of these issues. Furthermore, with increasing complexity of data and forms of data, the problem becomes multifold. The current special issue aims to build discussions and debate on these critical issues.