Man steals nude photos from thousands of women's e-mail accounts

[Vekseid]

http://www.pcworld.com/article/209584/cops_hacker_posted_stolen_xrated_pics_on_facebook.html

A 23-year-old California man is set to appear in court Tuesday, after police say he broke into the Web mail accounts of more than 3,000 women and posted sexually explicit images of many of them on Facebook.

George Samuel Bronk was arrested Friday following an investigation involving federal authorities and the California Highway Patrol's Computer Crimes Investigation Unit. He is set to be arraigned Tuesday afternoon in Sacramento County Court.

Investigators were tipped off after a Connecticut woman contacted local police saying that someone had posted sexually explicit photographs of her to her Facebook page. The photos had apparently been taken from a hacked Web mail account.

Investigators then linked the IP (Internet Protocol) address used to access the hacked accounts to Bronk's computer. They raided his Citrus Heights, California, home on Sept. 24 and discovered evidence that there may be thousands of victims, according to Sergeant Kelly Dixon, of the CHP's Computer Crimes Unit. Police also found images of child pornography on the computer, he added.

The case shows how the information stored on social media sites can be misused, and ultimately turned against victims. Police believe that Bronk broke into about 3,200 Web mail accounts by guessing the answers to password reset questions used by services such as Gmail, Yahoo Mail and Microsoft's Hotmail. "He didn't know any of them; he just apparently had a lot of time on his hands," Dixon said. "He would just search Facebook, look at females, and glean information."

...

And this is why I absolutely despise 'security questions'.

Tempted to file it as a bug against SMF's code even >_>

[Trieste]

They're not as straightforward as you'd think they are. Like, I used to have a security question of, "What is my cat's name?" and then I realized that I talk about all of my cats - by name - all the time. And while I've never tried to put an answer in, there are a few security questions that I've seen on Elliquiy profiles that I could make educated guesses on. I've never tried to see if I'm right, but some of them aren't that hard.

The things that are easiest to remember for you are the things that you talk about all the time.

[pavshia]

While this is a terrible thing to do and would really piss me off, I couldn't help thinking, "this guy needs something to do." How long did it take him to achieve all of this? How many hours did he spend snooping around and then trying to hack people's accounts? Stealing pictures? Then posting them? He really needs a day job. If I'm looking for a bright side, at least he was only doing this via computer and not actually following women around. I wonder what the sentence will be? Child porn charge will add a few years.

[AtlasEros]

What a dick move.

[Oniya]

If I'm looking for a bright side, at least he was only doing this via computer and not actually following women around. I wonder what the sentence will be? Child porn charge will add a few years.

The article is from November.  Shouldn't he have been sentenced already?

[Trieste]

According to Google, he pleaded guilty a few days ago, and his sentencing is in March.

[crystaltears]

And this is why I absolutely despise 'security questions'.

It's a good example of why I dislike social media sites like facebook.. Where they ask you to fill out the majority of the pre-generated security questions as part of your profile... (such as birth place, high school, favorite music/movie/book, etc.)

I don't even remember what my secret question is in most places to be honest (until the question is asked).. But my passwords and my secret answers (in more recent months at the very least) have a common theme of being mixed lower and upper case, numbers, and symbols... The more important things to me (such as my professional email) having the harder combinations and usually being unique to my list of passwords (never write a password down; it's all in my head). Those less important sometimes share their passwords with other places/applications.

But yeah, it's definitely an eye opener and I might go recheck my passwords and answers relatively soon now.

[Oniya]

I throw things into foreign languages (hey, all those dictionaries have to be good for something!), reverse them, add numbers, combine two words that have seemingly nothing to do with each other...

...and never send nude pictures to anyone.

[Callie Del Noire]

I gave someone (won't say who, when or where) several suggestions on what to do. Along with a faux book to hide in their shelf downstairs to store their passwords (the person in question is getting forgetful) and repeatedly tell them if they HAVE to keep a list it is not to be kept anywhere located near the PC. Not on the desk, in the room or on the same floor

It's not a perfect solution but you have to accommodate the fact that some folks can't handle password thing as well as others.

[Jeramiahh]

Cracked actually just ran an article on things like this, a few days ago, that's pretty relevant to this discussion!

http://www.cracked.com/article_18962_5-things-we-all-do-that-make-hackers-lives-incredibly-easy.html

[Sabby]

...this guy needs to either get a job, some friends, or laid, but I doubt anyone would wanna hang with someone who has kiddy porn... Still, if it weren't for that, I'd be pretty amused with the guys performance. I mean, why did he do it? 'For the lulz', obviously.

[Trieste]

Cracked actually just ran an article on things like this, a few days ago, that's pretty relevant to this discussion!

http://www.cracked.com/article_18962_5-things-we-all-do-that-make-hackers-lives-incredibly-easy.html

Cracked is actually really good at staying relevant, to the point that it borders on prescience.

[DudelRok]

*cough* Facebook is Evil *cough*

I, personally, stick with the whole "Can't remember passwords" deal and guess and check. Sometimes I get locked out, so I wait a few days. :p That's for the very few online places I need to log in.