The stunning leak of nude and intimate photos of scores of
celebrities may reach far wider than was previously known, involving the
breach of almost 600 online storage accounts, according to unsealed
federal court documents.
The "Celebgate" hack resulted in the posting on
Aug. 31 of almost 500 purported photos of Hollywood stars, models and
other celebrities — including Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton, Kirsten
Dunst, Kaley Cuoco and U.S. soccer star Hope Solo — to the Wild
West-like Internet forum 4chan, from which they quickly spread.
Apple Inc. confirmed the next day
that the photos were obtained through a "targeted attack" on personal
information used to maintain storage accounts on its iCloud system. The
FBI's Cybercrimes Unit launched an investigation.
As early as October, the investigation began
zeroing in on an address on the South Side of Chicago, the FBI said in a
search warrant affidavit recently unsealed in U.S. District Court in
Chicago.
Using phone records and computer identification
information called Internet protocol, or IP, data, investigators found
that the compromised accounts were accessed by a single computer linked
to two email addresses belonging to Emilio Herrera, 30.
The FBI — which did not say in the affidavit that Herrera is a suspect — said only that the investigation is ongoing.
It's important to note that the identification
of Herrera — who has no apparent criminal record — doesn't mean he is
necessarily a suspect. IP and email addresses can be masked or spoofed
through a variety of technologies, and Internet data can be routed
through third-party computers without their owners' knowledge using any
of a number of software packages.
No other documents have been publicly filed in
the case since the affidavit was unsealed, so it isn't known what
investigators found at Herrera's home. But in asking for the warrant,
the FBI revealed that potentially hundreds — theoretically almost 2,500 —
iCloud accounts were targeted.