The owner of a now-defunct website that trafficked in stolen nude photos of women, sometimes submitted by jilted ex-boyfriends, has agreed to plead guilty in Los Angeles to federal charges, according to court papers obtained Wednesday by City News Service.
Hunter Moore, of Woodland near Sacramento, will enter his plea to one count each of unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information and aggravated identity theft at a date to be scheduled, according to the plea agreement.
Moore allegedly paid co-defendant Charles “Gary Jones” Evens upwards of $200 a week to break into women’s email accounts and steal nude photos of them, which were posted on his now-defunct site IsAnyoneUp.com?
Evens, 26, of Studio City is currently set to go on trial in Los Angeles federal court on March 17.
Moore, now 28, posted nude or sexually explicit photos of women that were submitted without the victims’ permission for “revenge” purposes. The women’s names, professions, social-media profiles and cities of residence were often included, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Moore paid Evens to hack into victims’ email accounts to obtain additional photos for the site, which operated for about two years before shutting down in April 2012, prosecutors allege.
The website drew media attention and Moore was profiled in Rolling Stone — which dubbed him “the most hated man on the Internet” — and he appeared on TV talk shows hosted by Anderson Cooper and Dr. Drew Pinsky of “Loveline” fame.
Brandi Passante, a star of the A&E reality show “Storage Wars,” sued Moore for defamation in Santa Ana federal court in 2012.
Moore faces between two and seven years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
— City News Service