LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Last year, Netflix released a documentary, titled 'The Most Hated Man on the Internet', narrating the story of how Hunter Moore, who described himself as a "professional life ruiner", and his website, "Is Anyone Up?", was brought down. The "revenge porn" website created in 2010 ran successfully for two years, helping Moore earn thousands of dollars every month and victimizing over 40 people before it was finally brought down.

The 2022 Netflix documentary borrows its title from a Rolling Stone article that described Moore as the most hated man on the internet. It follows the story of how the mother of one of Moore's website's victims took it upon herself to fight and bring down the internet's most hated man, who had managed to ruin several lives using loopholes in the legal framework, claiming that his website was protected by the same laws as Facebook was. 

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What happened to Hunter Moore’s website, 'Is Anyone Up'?

Hunter Moore was arguably the man who gave birth to the practice of revenge porn, through his website, IsAnyoneUp.com. Even though the practice of leaking nude and sexually explicit images of people by their exes as revenge had existed in the past, it scaled up in popularity after 2010. "Revenge porn" was the business model Moore's website followed — anyone could upload explicit content of someone else without their consent and to make matters worse for the victims, more often than not, their details were shared along with their nude videos or pictures, linking their other social media handles to it. 

The ridicule and humiliation that the victims faced due to the website's content only boosted Moore's morale, it was as if he was enjoying a sadistic pursuit while earning thousands of dollars off of it. As per The Rolling Stone article that gave him the name "the most hated man on the internet", Moore responded to cease-and-desist letters with a simple "LOL." He had been permanently banned from Facebook, received death threats, got stabbed by a ballpoint pen, was blocked by PayPal, and even targeted by hacker group Anonymous; however, claiming that his site was protected by the Communications Decency Act of 1996, just like Facebook, Moore continued his site. The 1996 act did not allow websites to be held accountable for user­-submitted content.

However, his notoriety came to an end in less than two years, after his desire to expand his site's content reach led him to hack, and the FBI took matters into their own hands. The mother of one of Moore's victims, Charlotte Laws, conducted a two-year-long investigation compiling evidence from over 40 victims and gave it to the FBI. In 2012, he, along with a hacker named Charles Evens, came under the federal agency's radar, and the same year, Moore sold his website to Bullyville.com, an anti-bullying group run by former Marine James McGibney. All pornographic material has been removed from the website and users visiting it are redirected to Bullyville.com.

Where is Hunter Moore now?    

After being arrested by the FBI, Moore was indicted in a federal court in California on January 23, 2014, on charges of conspiracy, unauthorized access to a protected computer, and aggravated identity theft, as reported by Esquire. He was forced to dismantle the archives he owned for his website's database. On February 18, 2015, Moore entered a guilty plea with the Central District of California U.S. Attorney's Office, admitting to aggravated identity theft and aiding and abetting in the unauthorized access of a computer. 

On December 2, 2015, Moore was sentenced to two and a half years in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release. He was released on May 2017 and lives a quiet life outside the public eye. Moore has also been permanently banned from every social media platform.