Netflix's latest documentary Can I Tell You A Secret? delves into a real-life story of cyberstalking, and it will break your heart and blow your mind.
It follows the actions of prolific cyber stalker Matthew Hardy, and how he appeared online as a (mostly female) fake persona under the guise of fake social media accounts, spreading fake claims about his victims and making them fear for their relationships and their lives.
Alongside the victims, the documentary interviews police officers involved in the investigation as well as school friends of Matthew Hardy. It's a truly harrowing watch and often plays like a horror film, even though you're often keenly reminded that this story happened in real life.
“Hardy’s long campaign of harassment has had a lasting and profound impact on the women he targeted,” Can I Tell You A Secret’s executive producer Nancy Strang has said. “I hope their testimonies will shed light on the reality of online stalking and change the conversation about what constitutes harm in a digital age.”
Get a first look at the sequel here.
What is Can I Tell You A Secret about?
The documentary delves into the stories of a number of Hardy's victims, charting how they came in contact with his stalking (through him contacting them from fake social media accounts contacting them, generally). A fake account would reach out to them, suggest that there was a secret that they needed to divulge to the victim, trying to earn their trust.
Before they knew it, victims had experienced these accounts accessing and sending intimate photos to people in their lives, reached out to their families, positioned themselves in their relationships, suggesting that the victims had cheated on their partners. Hardy even invited older males to one woman's house, pretending to be her.
One victim even reported officers discussed prioritising “high profile” cases such as murder and rape, leaving the victim frightened that one of these crimes will happen to her before an investigation bore fruit.
The documentary also explores the aftermath of these attacks, with many victims reporting feeling like they missed out on periods of their lives because of Matthew Hardy's actions. Others have had to use antidepressants and experienced anxiety – some are too scared to go out or live alone. Others reported sleeping with weapons under their bed to feel safe.
Can I Tell You A Secret highlights not only the lack of action that the police took to stop Hardy from offending, but also the scary level of access that social media gives to people like him, enabling criminals to infiltrate your life.
In a world where we all spend a lot of time online, staying safe has never been more important.
Who is Matthew Hardy?
He is the UK's most prolific cyberstalker, beginning his offences when he was in secondary school back in 2006, using Facebook during its early years. According to The Guardian, he stalked 25 girls alone from one school in Cheshire, the area that he's from.
By the time he was imprisoned, Cheshire police reported that there were hundreds of victims. They were contacted more than 100 times by 62 victims over and 11-year period. He was arrested ten times over this stretch of time, but the police were unable to stop him from repeating offences and targeting new victims.
He began to target GLAMOUR columnist and women's rights activist Gina Martin (who is responsible for the successful campaign to make upskirting illegal) back in 2013, and the Crown Prosecution Service decline to bring the case forward when she reported him in 2016. Gina has described waking up daily to people in her life messaging her about impersonation accounts Hardy had made and contacted them on.
The experience had a huge impact on her: “People say that upskirting was the first thing I ever did,” Martin told The Guardian. “But that’s not true. I took that incident so hard because three months previously the CPS dropped the case I had against Matthew Hardy. Being a victim of Matthew Hardy fed heavily into the reason I do this work.”
How was Matthew Hardy caught for cyberstalking?
Cheshire police officer PC Kevin Anderson was assigned to the case in December 2019, who quickly was horrified by the sheer number of victims that had built up. He got in touch with one of the victims, paralegal Lia Marie Hambly, who had kept over 700 pages of documentation containing her communications with Hardy – this strengthened the case considerably.
By 2019, Hardy had been arrested 10 times and the police had 100 logs on the system about him from 62 victims.
He pled guilty to stalking involving fear of violence and harassment, after breaching a restraining order.
“Every man I saw, I wondered, ‘Is it him? Is he following me?’”
When was Matthew Hardy arrested and how long was he sentenced for?
Hardy was arrested in 2020 and charged in March 2021, but continued to stalk people on bail, including messaging Gina pretending to be her dead grandmother, who had passed away the previous year from Covid.
He was given a custodial sentence of nine years for five counts of stalking, after over a decade of terrorising his victims, who were mostly young women. This is the longest stalking sentence heard of by the Suzy Lamplugh Trust, an anti-stalking charity.
That said, Hardy was known to the police for over a decade before he was arrested and charged – this (and the documentary itself) highlights the work that needs to be done to ensure that offenders like him are brought to justice much quicker before they can do as much harm as Hardy has to so many people.
Can I Tell You A Secret? will be available to watch on Netflix from 21 February.
