Yesterday, more than 100 celebrities reportedly fell victim to a dramatic invasion of privacy after their personal images were published online by an anonymous hacker.
Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton, Victoria Justice, and Ariana Grande are believed to fall on the list of starlets whose private images were stolen and shared on multiple websites.
“The authorities have been contacted and will prosecute anyone who posts the stolen photos,” a spokeswoman for Lawrence said.
The suspects were able to access the celebrity photos from a cloud-based storage system through a trial and error method. Apple has since patched the security gap that would allow this to happen.
Technical experts indicated that there was a “wide range of security flaws” for this type of attack and that the images could have been imported from Dropbox and Google Drive in addition to iCloud.
Celebrities and their representatives have questioned the integrity of the photos.
“These photos are completely fake,” Ariana Grande’s spokeswoman claimed.
“These so called nudes of me are FAKE people,” Disney star Victoria Justice tweeted.
On the contrary, Kate Upton’s attorney has confirmed the model’s identity in the pictures.
“We intend to pursue anyone disseminating or duplicating these illegally obtained images to the fullest extent possible,” Upton’s legal counsel stated.
The hacking of celebrity accounts has become increasingly popular throughout the years. Paris Hilton was said to be one of the first celebrities involved in such a violation, after her cell photos were stolen in 2005.
Just two years ago, a Florida man was prosecuted and sentenced to ten years in a federal prison for pirating nude photos and e-mail account information from Scarlett Johansson, Christina Aguilera, and Mila Kunis.
The Independent reported this morning that the unidentified hacker is now threatening to release video footage of Jennifer Lawrence engaging in a sexual act. The individual was speculated to be accepting donations, via Paypal, for the video.
“I know no one will believe me, but I have a short Lawrence video,” the hacker wrote.
The Daily Mail released information this afternoon about today’s mystery thief, who has now thanked his “supporters” and accomplices just before fleeing his first location. He has referred to himself as the “original guy” and admitted that he acquired a team to pull off the conspiracy, which apparently took months of hard work.
“Guys, just to let you know. I didn’t do this by myself,” he declared. “I will soon be moving to another location from which I will continue to post.”
FBI involvement is promising, as per Jennifer Lawrence’s request, while the hunt for the serial hacker continues.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.