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“One of the hackers responsible for compromising hundreds of nude photos of celebrities including Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton and Kirsten Dunst has pleaded guilty to computer misuse charges relating to the 2014 scandal dubbed ‘The Fappening’ or ‘Celebgate’. Following an FBI-led investigation, 36-year-old Ryan Collins of Lancaster, Pennslyvania, was charged with illegally gaining access to more than 100 Apple and Google email accounts and now faces up to five years in federal prison, according to the US Department of Justice.

“Now, Collins has signed a plea agreement and will plead guilty to a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and, with a maximum prison term of up to five years, the filings indicate the term served will likely be closer to 18 months. The court filings show that Collins engaged in a phishing scheme between November 2012 and September 2014 in order to obtain usernames and passwords of his victims’ email accounts. In total, the hacker was able to compromise at least 50 iCloud accounts and 72 Gmail accounts, most of which belonged to female celebrities.

“By posing as account administrators and tricking his victims into handing over login credentials, Collins would then log in and download the entire content of the backups saved on the account before searching for compromising photos or personal information.”

“Collins sent fake emails that appeared to be from Apple or Google to encourage his victims to unknowningly hand over their usernames and passwords. … In addition, Collins ran a modeling scam in which he tricked his victims into sending him nude photographs. However, the attorney’s office noted that investigators have not uncovered any evidence Collins uploaded or shared the information and images or that he was linked to the actual leaks.”