Hacker Faces up to Five Years in Prison for Illegally Obtaining Nude Celebrity Photos

Jessica Lachenal

Published: Feb 19, 2016 04:51 pm

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Andrew Helton, the hacker who obtained nude celebrity photos through a phishing scheme, has just plead guilty to his crimes. His felony could earn him up to five years in prison.

Over the course of two years, Helton obtained 448 usernames and passwords from 363 e-mail accounts, according to Deadline. Many of his victims work in the entertainment industry, placing him close to many celebrities. All told, he had obtained 161 sexually explicit photos, many of which were photos of celebrities. The names of those celebrities have not been made public.

Helton’s sentencing is set to take place on June 2nd. It’s important to note that Helton was not the hacker behind the Fappening, which was a website upon which many nude celebrity photos were posted.

(via Deadline, image via Shutterstock/Brian A Jackson)

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Jessica Lachenal

Jessica Lachenal is a writer who doesn’t talk about herself a lot, so she isn’t quite sure how biographical info panels should work. But here we go anyway. She's the Weekend Editor for The Mary Sue, a Contributing Writer for The Bold Italic (thebolditalic.com), and a Staff Writer for Spinning Platters (spinningplatters.com). She's also been featured in Model View Culture and Frontiers LA magazine, and on Autostraddle. She hopes this has been as awkward for you as it has been for her.