Icloud leaks of celebrity photos reddit

Users complain company is selectively enforcing rules Company cites takedown notices with which it must comply. The social news platform Reddit has banned pages which allowed users to view, post and share stolen images of celebrities. The banning followed six days of huge traffic — reportedly more than m views — and mounting criticism that Reddit was facilitating the humiliation of Jennifer LawrenceKate Upton and Kirsten Dunst, among other celebrities. Icloud leaks of celebrity photos reddit same practice was occurring with the underage photos, requiring our constant intervention … it became obvious that we were either going to have to watch these subreddits constantly, or shut them down.

If you saw Kate Upton or Jennifer Lawrence naked last week, there's a good chance you saw them on the social news site Reddit. The self-proclaimed "front page of the Internet" was one of the main outlets linking to the celebrity nude photographs hacked from Apple's iCloud accounts and leaked across the web. Over the weekend, Reddit cleaned up the portions of the site devoted to the stolen photosbut not before it had made a significant chunk of revenue from its role in the massive celebrity sext-spillage. In just six days, Reddit earned enough money from the nude pics scandal to power its servers for roughly a month, says John Menese, the year-old creator of a Reddit sub-forum expressly launched to share the photos. Each subreddit publicly displays the amount of server time paid for by its members' Reddit gold, and Menese tracked his forum's contribution until just before it went offline.

Icloud leaks of celebrity photos reddit

The website called the photos "deplorable. Reddit has a longstanding policy of allowing users to post pretty much whatever they want -- so long as what they post abides by U. Since the United States does not prohibit online links to stolen material, Reddit says it was not obligated to taking the photos down. Related: Apple to beef up security measures after nude photo leak. Harvey said that Reddit's staff had a lengthy internal debate about what to do with TheFappening. Many Reddit employees were morally opposed to keeping the subreddit up, particularly because it was so immensely popular. The subreddit generated million page views in the week or so that it hosted the nude celebrity photos, according to " Johnsmcjohn ," the redditor who created TheFappening. Reddit acknowledged that it hit a new traffic milestone, as a result of TheFappening, adding the company was "ashamed" to share the numbers publicly. As a result of the photos' popularity, Reddit said it was being overloaded with so-called DMCA takedown requests, in which copyright holders can demand that certain content be taken off of a website. The celebrities' representatives overwhelmed Reddit's legal team. The company also noted that some of the photos were of minors, violating Reddit's terms and conditions and U. Related: Welcome to the Age of Hacks. This same practice was occurring with the underage photos, requiring our constant intervention. It became obvious that we were either going to have to watch these subreddits constantly, or shut them down. We chose the latter.

Retrieved September 17, Archived from the original on November 17,

On August 31, , a collection of nearly five hundred private pictures of various celebrities, mostly women, with many containing nudity , were posted on the imageboard 4chan , and swiftly disseminated by other users on websites and social networks such as Imgur and Reddit. The leak was dubbed " The Fappening " or " Celebgate " by the public. The images were initially believed to have been obtained via a breach of Apple 's cloud services suite iCloud , [1] [2] or a security issue in the iCloud API which allowed them to make unlimited attempts at guessing victims' passwords. The incident was met with varied reactions from the media and fellow celebrities. Critics argued the leak was a major invasion of privacy for the photos' subjects, while some of the alleged subjects denied the images' authenticity. The leak also prompted increased concern from analysts surrounding the privacy and security of cloud computing services such as iCloud—with a particular emphasis on their use to store sensitive, private information. Though the term is a vulgarism originating either with the imageboards where the pictures were initially posted or Reddit, mainstream media outlets soon adopted the term themselves, such as the BBC.

Edward Majerczyk — a hacker who used phishing scams to gain access to celebrities' iCloud accounts — has pleaded guilty, and will face up to five years in federal prison. Majerczyk was able to access over Gmail and iCloud accounts, with at least 30 accounts belonging to celebrities. This defendant not only hacked into e-mail accounts — he hacked into his victims' private lives, causing embarrassment and lasting harm. As most of us use devices containing private information, cases like this remind us to protect our data. Members of society whose information is in demand can be even more vulnerable, and directly targeted. Majerczyk is the second person to plead guilty to hacking into celebrities' accounts, after Ryan Collins also confessed earlier this year. While both are charged with gaining "unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information," the court did not find any evidence tying them to the distribution of explicit content:. However, investigators have not uncovered any evidence linking Majerczyk to the actual leaks.

Icloud leaks of celebrity photos reddit

Users complain company is selectively enforcing rules Company cites takedown notices with which it must comply. The social news platform Reddit has banned pages which allowed users to view, post and share stolen images of celebrities. The banning followed six days of huge traffic — reportedly more than m views — and mounting criticism that Reddit was facilitating the humiliation of Jennifer Lawrence , Kate Upton and Kirsten Dunst, among other celebrities. This same practice was occurring with the underage photos, requiring our constant intervention … it became obvious that we were either going to have to watch these subreddits constantly, or shut them down. We chose the latter.

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March 1, Archived from the original on August 18, Celebrities who denied the photos' authenticity include Ariana Grande [39] [40] and Yvonne Strahovski. Though the term is a vulgarism originating either with the imageboards where the pictures were initially posted or Reddit, mainstream media outlets soon adopted the term themselves, such as the BBC. The Federal Bureau of Investigation said it was "aware of the allegations concerning computer intrusions and the unlawful release of material involving high profile individuals, and is addressing the matter". Archived from the original on April 13, Detroit Free Press. We chose the latter. He points to other existing corners of Reddit focused on stolen nudes, like the "celebs" subreddit or "candid fashion police," where users post creep shots of women under the guise of critiquing their fashion sense. New Web Order. TheFappening subreddit, home to celebrities' hacked nude photos, has been banned. Archived from the original on August 31,

Update September 2: After spending more than 40 hours investigating the attack, Apple concluded the celebrity photos were accessed in a "very targeted attack" and not through an iCloud security breach. The company released a statement on September 2 outlining its findings, namely that neither iCloud or Find my iPhone were breached to obtain the photos. However, it does sound like individual iCloud accounts were compromised, thus leading to the leaks.

Since the United States does not prohibit online links to stolen material, Reddit says it was not obligated to taking the photos down. Actress Lena Dunham pleaded on Twitter for people not to view the photos, arguing that in doing so "you are violating these women over and over again. Archived from the original on December 9, By September 6, when Reddit finally pulled TheFappening from the site, the majority of the forum's users visitors likely had moved on. In an interview with Vanity Fair , victim Jennifer Lawrence called the leak a "sex crime" and a "sexual violation"; she added, "Anybody who looked at those pictures, you're perpetuating a sexual offense. March 1, Archived from the original on April 8, Retrieved June 23, The images were initially believed to have been obtained via a breach of Apple 's cloud services suite iCloud , [1] [2] or a security issue in the iCloud API which allowed them to make unlimited attempts at guessing victims' passwords. Retrieved April 22, In October , the FBI searched a house in Chicago , Illinois and seized several computers, cellphones and storage drives after tracking the source of a hacking attack to an IP address linked to an individual named Emilio Herrera. USA Today. A quarter billion page views and I think the people who stole the photos are".