Miss Teen USA hacker pleads guilty

[Jazzy]

A US teenager has pleaded guilty to hacking into the computers of young women, using their webcams to take photos, and then threatening the victims with blackmail.

Prosecutors had accused Jared James Abrahams of carrying out the attacks over a two-year period.

The current winner of the Miss Teen USA beauty pageant - Cassidy Wolf - had been identified as one of his targets.

The 19-year-old computer science student will be sentenced in March.

He faces up to 11 years in jail and $1m (£626,000) in fines.

Photo threats

According to prosecutors, at least two dozen women in the US, Ireland and elsewhere had their PCs hacked by Abrahams.

Court records state that the computer science student told the women - who ranged from the age of 16 to their early 20s - that he had taken pictures of them while they were undressed. He then threatened to post the images to social media sites unless they sent additional photos or stripped via a Skype video feed.

The authorities said at least two of the victims had complied.

Cassidy Wolf - a schoolmate of Abrahams - did not respond to his threats.

Abrahams later posted a naked photo of the beauty queen online and is reported to have sent her a message saying: "Your dream of being a model will be transformed into a porn star."

Appearing in court at Santa Ana, California, he pleaded guilty to three counts of extortion and one count of unauthorized computer access.

Full article

If this happened to you, would you have done what he asked to prevent him from posting your pictures social media sites? Why / Why not?

 

[Nebulous's iconNebulous]

11 years in jail.. This goes to show that what you do on the internet DOES have consequences.