Reported iCloud Hack Leaks Hundreds of Private Celebrity Photos 336
swinferno writes with news about the leak of hundreds of private celebrity photos over the weekend. Hundreds of revealing pictures of female celebrities were leaked overnight after being stolen from their private collections. Hunger Games actress Jennifer Lawrence, Kirsten Dunst, and pop star Ariana Grande were among the celebrities apparently shown in the pictures, which were posted on infamous web forum 4chan. It's unclear how the images were obtained, but anonymous 4chan users said that they were taken from celebrities' iCloud accounts. The accounts are designed to allow iPhone, iPad, and Mac users to synchronize images, settings, calendar information, and other data between devices, but the service has been criticized for being unreliable and confusing. Earlier this year, Jennifer Lawrence herself complained about the service in an interview with MTV.
Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where are these photos you speak of?
I guess the internets are dead.
Re:Here they come... (Score:5, Insightful)
Paraphrasing something I just read somewhere on the Internet:
When somebody says 'the cloud', mentally replace it by 'somebody else's computer'.
"complained about the service" (Score:3, Insightful)
Then dont use it. Pretty simple. There is no law that says you have to use any cloud service, so if you dont trust/like them, dont use them. And dont bitch about it when you choose to do so.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
What it comes down to is, if you don't want naked pictures of yourself to end up for all the world to see, don't take naked pictures of yourself. Famous or not, just don't do it.
Yes, it's wrong for someone to seek to steal your nude photos, but pragmatically people want to satisfy their prurient interests. If you're famous and if your beauty was in large-part responsible for getting you there, you've created incentive for those fans to want to see more. That's why programs like Entertainment Tonight, Extra, and TMZ can make a living, because people want to satisfy their prurient interests with you. Some like Paris Hilton and Mrs. Kanye West and the rest of the Kardashian family have managed to exploit that successfully in the past, and others like Miley Cyrus are trying very hard to exploit that now, and unfortunately their antics have helped to make it acceptable, to an extent, for this invasive phenomenon to stand.
Once the genie's out of the bottle it's over. Apparently Lawrence's lawyers are threatening to sue or refer for criminal prosecution anyone that shares the photos of her. I very much doubt they'll have a lot of luck though, even if the original source of the leak is found. If anything they're just going to make it worse via Streisand Effect.
And for those that say I'm blaming the victim, yes, I am blaming the victim. I'm also blaming the leaker and the culture of invasiveness that makes these leaks so incredibly desired, but I am blaming the victim. Would you go walking through a part of town known for muggings during the time of day or night when those muggings are most likely to happen? Yeah, it's wrong for the mugger to attack you, but armed with the knowledge that you're placing yourself in undue risk you'd generally avoid doing that because the only behavior that you can control is your own. Same thing applies here. It's 100% wrong for someone to fraudulently obtain access to your account and your cache of nude photos of yourself, but you know that if others know they exist they'll certainly try, or if you're famous you know that they'll try just to see if they exist in the first place, so despite the very much known risk you've put yourself in a position to become a victim. Don't do that.
Re:Here they come... (Score:4, Insightful)
Still, allowing brute force over the internet is a big mistake.
Let me get this straight... (Score:5, Insightful)
Somebody:
1) Takes nude photos of themselves with an internet-connected device.
2) Has said photos of themselves synchronized with an internet service
3) Is surprised / outraged that said photos are accessed by somebody on the internet.
I'm not saying that those people are to blame, but rather that there is a significant disconnect between technology and users' expectations. And the companies involved aren't making things any better with their hand-waving "cloud" mumbo-jumbo.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
Some outrage motivated by image control/PR/money? (Score:5, Insightful)
As far as I know, Jennifer Lawrence has never done a nude scene in a movie. Is some of the outrage due to that maybe Jennifer Lawrence as an actress is more appealing/alluring in some roles because she's not been seen on screen nude and thus manages to increase her allure by keeping the mystery alive (although X-Men and American Hustle did about everything possible to reveal that mystery)
It does seem to be something of a female celebrity career trope that when they hit a mature phase of their careers they start opting for roles that involve a lot of nudity under some kind of guise that it's a challenging or artistically complex thing to do. Usually the more explicit the nudity and/or sex the greater press it draws and with any luck a bump to the actress' career.
Could Jennifer Lawrence ALSO be motivated by the fact that being nude in a movie is some way passé now -- ie, taking a role with nudity would no longer bring any added celebrity or notoriety because we've already seen that?
I'm not implying she doesn't have other, better reasons to be annoyed -- celebrities are people too, and like their privacy. I'm just curious to what extent the outrage isn't somewhat motivated by a celebrity's desire to flog an image of sexuality for maximum return.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:4, Insightful)
Really good points, all - it's not like someone broke into these people's houses & took pictures of them in the nude unawares. However... I don't think that the "victims" here are necessarily freaking out that the pictures exist or are worried what the public will think of their naked bodies (as you pointed out they are mostly beautiful anyway). I think that they are trying to treat the stealing & dissemination of stolen images as a crime, which it is.
So while I agree that the best solution to keeping your nudie pics off the web is to not take them in the first place (as Joshua would say: "The only winning move is not to play") , I am all for treating it like a crime and following up even if your actions end up Streisand Effecting your photos in the process.
Re:Wrong idea. (Score:5, Insightful)
Can't trust cell phone cameras. By definition it's a camera attached to a communications device. It's designed to share that photo.
Can't trust storing it on a PC as PCs are connected to the Internet in the overwhelming majority of instances.
Can't even store on many modern-day cameras, as they're communincations-enabled.
Then there's the whole point of a picture, looking it at it. Typically that means more than just the picture-taker looking at it if the photographer and the subject are the same person (ie, selfie), or the subject is not the photographer, then the subject is trusting that the photographer won't leave the image vulnerable to all of the possibilities above, and won't intentionally share it as well.
For all we know, none of these women's accounts were compromised. Their boyfriends, husbands, ex-boyfriends, ex-husbands, girlfriends, ex-girlfriends accounts could have been, or those people could have shared the photos with others, and their accounts were compromised.
I guess what it comes down to is, if it exists, it could be evidence. The only solution is to not let it exist in the first place.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:4, Insightful)
You get a shot at seeing boobies and all the sudden all those complaints you have about the NSA peeking at your files goes flying out the window. When that's brought up all the sudden we've got something worthwhile to spend our mod-points on. Cute.
Let me make this simple in case there's a post-fap-clearer-head lurking around this area of the thread: No, you do not have a good reason to acquire those photos. Yes, you are a bad person for grabbing them and sharing them. No, modding my posts down does not make me wrong about it. You lot, and you know who you are, are despicable.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:3, Insightful)
More than a decade ago my pickup truck was stolen out of the parking lot of the apartment that I lived in. I didn't have a steering wheel lock or other immobilization device on it and per my parents' advice only had liability coverage, as it was an older truck and only worth a couple-thousand dollars Unfortunately I had also just been laid-off, and couldn't afford to buy another vehicle and left with none. I bore at least some responsibility as I did not make an effort to see how theft-prone these trucks were, did not use anything to make the vehicle a harder target, and didn't have the insurance necessary to deal with it. My parents also accepted some blame in that the insurance situation was their idea, and they let me borrow a vehicle until I found work, then they bought me a cheap vehicle and I paid them back as I could afford to.
Blaming the victim does not mean demonizing the victim. It means there's an understanding that the victim took unnecessary risks and suffered the consequences of those risks when the odds fell against their favor. This is a cruel world that we live in, and while it's nice to think that maybe some day people won't commit acts against each other, that is never going to happen and we all have to do our part to protect ourselves, as again, we can only affect our own behavior, not anyone else's.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
If someone put their money in a reputable bank and it was stolen, would you blame them? The photos were in password protected accounts from a reputable company that claimed to be secure. There were no "your photos may be hacked" warnings. While it may seem obvious to people like us that the risk is there, most people don't think that way and can't really be blamed for not doing so. How is a password for iCloud any different from the password for your online banking or PIN number for the average person?
They evaluated the risks with the information they had, and Apple failed them. If Apple were a bank they would be entirely liable for any financial loss, no question.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't put iCloud in the same category as Dropbox, OneDrive or Google Drive. iCloud is a joke and people use it only because it's bundled with the iDevices and shoved down people's throat (like IE).
Apple has a culture of nonchalance and carelessness because they have a strong brand and a captive customer base. Shame on them for putting their users in a tough spot and not caring about it.
Most cloud providers offer a very secure hosting environment. Apple should do the right thing: forget their iCloud and build instead a partnership with a company that knows how to operate cloud services. Just like Netflix had the guts to pull the plug on their own infrastructure and leverage AWS.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:3, Insightful)
What a bunch of nonsense. How do they "really really really" push iPhoto on Macs? It's there and it launches if you don't have photo imports associated with another app instead. I guess you would prefer that Macs come unable to handle photos out of the box?
When a person hates Macs, they can't stand the color of the power cord.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
I buy a phone, and I'm an idiot. Specifically, I'm a very attractive hollywood star/let.
I want to share my tits with some person I'm dating. How do I know anything about what you have said? I want my tit pics to go across the water, and only to the person that I sent them to, or allowed to see them.
Talk to me like I'm an idiot, because by the lists I am an idiot. I'm a very ignorant fool, and I don't understand how the pictures I took, for a specific person, are now appearing for every person on the planet to see.
What did I do wrong? I took pictures of my vagina. That's on my phone. I texted them to you, and you are on my carrier, which I would expect is private. If you support the non-pprivacy of anything I upload to my phone (which is not an upload), then you are a contrarian and deserve to die.
I text to a private device, or upload to a private account. How do I share something "by default" that people, right now, are jerking off to, by reports, "repeatedly and thoroughly"? I bought a phone, I texted it to someone I trust, and now my "junk" is everywhere.
I was prompted for an Apple Id, I guess, but did it tell me that my vagina would be on the internet?
Did I upload something to the cloud? Because I don't know what a cloud is. I wanted to prove to this really cute and awesome guy that I missed him and wanted him to come back after shooting his movie or show or whatever, I'm not being specific.
Was it in a ToS agreement that I upload everything to everyone ever? If not, your description of default whatever holds no water. I don't know the defaults. I don't know what I have to turn on or off to enable or disable defaults. I want pictures of my pussy on my pohone, and wherever I send them. That's it.
Go ahead, and be technically superior. I'm going to need a stupid-user-level explanation of what I missed because I'm dumb.
Re:Where are these photos? (Score:5, Insightful)
While not strictly true, if you follow the standard setup "workflow" as 95% of all computer do, you end up with icloud enabled.
I'd put $100 on all these celebrities just following setup instructions and ending up with icloud enabled, because they simply don't know better.