Last 2014, the internet went wild as nude and stolen photos of celebrities such as Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton, and Rihanna went viral. The photos were uploaded to sites like 4Chan and Reddit.
The 36-year-old Ryan Collins, from Pennsylvania, was one of the two suspects for the leak which was known as the Fappening. Collins stole nude photos and personal information of celebrities as well. Per the Department of Justice, Collins illegally accessed the accounts of the celebrities and searched for nude photos and videos.
"He sent e-mails to victims that appeared to be from Apple or Google and asked victims to provide their usernames and passwords," said the DOJ in a press release, "After illegally accessing the e-mail accounts, Collins obtained personal information including nude photographs and videos. In some instances, Collins would use a software program to download the entire contents of the victims' Apple iCloud backups."
Collins also ran a modeling scam which he then tricked his victims into sending him nude photos. He was arrested last March and was charged with hacking at least 50 iCloud accounts and 72 Gmail accounts according to The Register.
The second suspect, 28-year-old Edward Majerczyk, from Illinois, was also caught last July and charged with hacking at least 300 iCloud and Gmail accounts. All-in-all both have hacked more than 600 victims, although not all were celebrities.
Both have pleaded guilty to the charges but did not plead guilty for posting the images online as reported by CNET. There is also no sufficient proof to confirm that both were, in fact, responsible for sharing or uploading the files they obtained. Collins then reduced his sentence from five years in prison to 18 months through the plea.
As a result of the incident last 2014, Google was also threatened with $100M lawsuit by the celebrities that were a victim of the leak for not acting immediately and responsibly to remove the photos.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
