Second Celebrity Nude Photo Hack Targets Rihanna, Kim Kardashian, and Amber Heard
Rihanna. (Reuters)
Another weekend, another violation of famous women’s privacy.
Yesterday, a new trove of naked celebrity photos leaked on 4chan and Reddit, the same sites used to distribute the massive celebrity photo hack that took place earlier this month.
In this round, new images of Jennifer Lawrence, Kim Kardashian, Rihanna, Amber Heard, Hayden Panettiere, Lake Bell, Kate Bosworth, Emily Ratajkowski, Jenny McCarthy, Gabrielle Union, and more were posted in the online forums. Additionally, some private clips of Aubrey Plaza and Jennifer Lawrence were also released.
Though few of the victims have commented, Gabrielle Union and her husband Dwyane Wade released a statement to TMZ expressing disgust at the hack.
“It has come to our attention that our private moments, that were shared and deleted solely between my husband and myself, have been leaked by some vultures,” the statement read. “I can’t help but to be reminded that since the dawn of time women and children, specifically women of color, have been victimized, and the power over their own bodies taken from them. These atrocities against women and children continue worldwide. For anyone out there also being affected by these and other hacking and hate crimes — We send our love, support and prayers. We have done nothing wrong.”
A loose ring of hackers dedicated to posting naked celebrity images is thought to be held responsible, but it’s unclear how, exactly, they were able to violate the individual accounts of the latest round of victims. The previous Celebgate leak turned attention to Apple’s iCloud security settings, which many users have not padlocked with two-step verification.
When the nudes leaked three weeks ago, an Apple spokesperson denied any systemwide security flaws. However, company CEO Tim Cook later backpedaled on the issue, saying his company could have done more to alert people to the vulnerabilities in their accounts.
“When I step back from this terrible scenario that happened and say what more could we have done, I think about the awareness piece,” he told The Wall Street Journal. “I think we have a responsibility to ratchet that up. That’s not really an engineering thing.”
As a result, he said, those who use iCloud would receive security alerts anytime someone tries to change their account password, download iCloud files to a new device, or log in to their account on a new device.
Unfortunately, those changes may be too late for the celebrities whose accounts were broken into before this feature was added. Union and Wade, at least, are instead turning to the FBI to resolve the situation.
When reached for comment, Apple declined to speak on the incident.
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