Where are 'The Fappening' hackers? Jennifer Lawrence still reels from 2014 nude leak
Despite "The Fappening" happening almost seven years ago, it is still a heavily trending search word on Google and it is something that will haunt Jennifer Lawrence for the rest of her life.
The Fappening, also known as Celebgate, refers to the hacking and leaking of hundreds of nude photos of over 100 celebrities, including, most notoriously, those of Lawrence and Rihanna back in 2014. The iCloud pictures were shared on the then-open image-sharing forum 4chan as well as Reddit, at times in exchange for payment, usually cryptocurrency. Lawrence became the face of the scandal because she was one of the most high-profile celebs on the list and because her angry response at the time shut down the slut-shaming comments that had started pouring in against her.
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In a new interview with Vanity Fair magazine this week, the 'Hunger Games' actress admitted that she still lives with the trauma of having her nude pictures out there for everyone to see. “Anybody can go look at my naked body without my consent, at any time of day. Somebody in France just published them. My trauma will exist forever," she said.
Lawrence had lashed out against the hackers at the time in an interview with the same magazine. “It is not a scandal. It is a sex crime,” she famously said, comparing it to being "gangbanged by the f***ing planet". "It is a sexual violation. It's disgusting. The law needs to be changed, and we need to change. That's why these websites are responsible. Just the fact that somebody can be sexually exploited and violated, and the first thought that crosses somebody's mind is to make a profit from it. It's so beyond me. I just can't imagine being that detached from humanity. I can't imagine being that thoughtless and careless and so empty inside," she added. She also made it clear that anyone searching for these pictures or downloading them was complicit in this sex crime.
Where are hackers responsible for The Fappening?
So far, the US Department of Justice has charged five people with links to The Fappening. The first was Ryan Collins, 36, of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the second was Edward Majerczyk, 29, of Chicago, Illinois, the third was Emilio Herrera, 32, of Chicago, Illinois, the fourth one was George Garofano, 26, of Northford, Connecticut and the fifth one was Christopher Brannan, from Virginia. The fifth one was arrested back in 2018.
Collins agreed to plead guilty to one count of "unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information" back in 2016. He is said to have conducted a series of phishing schemes between 2012 and 2014, in which he sent emails to his victims asking them to update their passwords, pretending to be Apple or Google. Once they responded, he used that information to gain access to their personal information. At times, he downloaded the entire contents of their iCloud libraries. In total, he hacked at least 50 iCloud and 72 Gmail accounts, prosecutors say, "most of which belonged to female celebrities." In October 2016, Collins was sentenced to 18 months in prison.
In August 2016, Majerczyk agreed to plead guilty to a similar phishing scheme and was jailed for nine months on January 24, 2017. He was also ordered to pay $5,700 in restitution to cover the counseling services of one unnamed celebrity victim. He was accused of breaking into the emails and online storage accounts of up to 30 celebrities including Lawrence and model Kate Upton. It is believed that he worked independently and he was not accused of selling the images or posting them online.
Herrera pleaded guilty to one count of unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information in October 2017. He was not accused of being involved in leaking or sharing the photos and videos he obtained despite accessing the accounts of unnamed celebrities and others. He was sentenced to 16 months in jail in March 2018.
Prosecutors found that between April 2013 through October 2014, Garafono used phishing emails posing as Apple's security department to trick victims into giving in their iCloud credentials. It was not clear if he worked with Collins, Majerczyk, and Herrera. In April 2018, he pleaded guilty to one count of unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information. On August 29, 2018, a federal court sentenced Garofano to eight months in prison.
Brannan, who was a former teacher, pled guilty to federal charges of aggravated identity theft and unauthorized access to a protected computer. Apart from celebrities, he also targeted his underage sister-in-law, as well as teachers and students at the school where he used to teach. On March 1, 2019, Brannan was sentenced to 34 months in prison.