A 40-year-old is accused of hacking and stealing 620,000 iCloud photos from users to search for nude images of women after pretending to be Apple tech support in emails.
Hao Kuo Chi, 40, of La Puente, California, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and three counts of gaining unauthorized access to a protected computer, according to court records.
He reached an estimated 620,000 photos of at least 306 victims, the majority of them being young women, the FBI estimated. He reached 200 of his victims online after he marketed himself as someone who could hack into iCloud accounts. He used the user name 'iclouddripper4you.'
The FBI said it found two Gmail addresses attached to the user names Chi used during his scam - 'applebackupicloud' and 'backupagenticloud' - with more than 500,000 emails and 4,700 iCloud IDs and passwords.
Hao Kuo Chi, 40, of La Puente, California, hacked into 306 Apple users' iCloud accounts in search of nude images and videos of young women
'Customers' would request he hack into certain iCloud accounts and he responded with a Dropbox link, according to a court statement by FBI agent Anthony Bossone.
His Dropbox account contained roughly 620,000 images and 9,000 videos from his customers.
The content was organized, in part, based on which item contained nude images.
He communicated with his unnamed co-conspirators via foreign encrypted emails and considered finding a nude image 'a win', authorities said. They collected and shared the nude images and videos with one another.
The FBI estimated that Chi had more than 620,000 images and 9,000 videos from his victims and he and his unnamed co-conspirators considering finding nude images a 'win.' Chi pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and three counts of gaining unauthorized access to a protected computer
He admitted he didn't even 'know who was involved,' Chi told the Los Angeles Times.
The scam started to fall apart in March 2018 when a popular California company, known for removing celebrity images from the internet, notified an unnamed public figure in Tampa, Florida, about their nude images appearing on pornographic sites.
The images were stored on their iPhone and had been uploaded to iCloud.
Bossone reported investigators later discovered the victim's iCloud had been accessed from Chi's home.
The FBI got a search warrant and raided Chi's home on May 19.
Before this, investigators found Chi's Dropbox, Apple, Google and Facebook accounts, and had a record of his online activities.
On August 5, Chi pleaded guilty to four charges and faces up to five years in prison for each charge.
In a similar 2007 instance, several Geek Squad members from around the country admitted they saw co-workers saving users' personal photos and videos onto DVDs.
Former Geek Squad member Brett Haddock told the Baltimore Sun at the time, 'Any attractive young woman who drops off her computer with the Geek Squad should assume that her photos will be looked at.'
Apple has faced backlash for years over the ongoing privacy and security issues with user information.
Recently, an Israel NSO Group delivered malware directly to users' phone via text, bypassing Apple's security features.
Pegasus, their surveillance tool, was able to collect emails, call records, social media posts, user passwords, contact lists, pictures, videos and more from 23 users.
It also could activate microphones and cameras, and collect fresh data, including location, without the user interacting or knowing it was on their phone.
More than 50,000 phone numbers from more than 50 countries had been collected, according to the Washington Post.
This damaged Apple's reputation of being secure and safe for its users.
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