In a shocking incident, a hacker broke into a US college student's Snapchat account, illegally accessed nude photos and sent them to her friends, a cousin, an ex-boyfriend, and dozens of acquaintances. While most of those who received the message thought she had sent the photos, her friend Katie Yates understood she had been conned.
The woman, reported Bloomberg, was severely traumatised due to the incident. She said her ears were ringing and she was unable to breathe due to the mental trauma she faced. Yates said she removed sharp objects from her dorm room fearing she might hurt herself.
What she was facing was sextortion, a form of crime that is on the rise in the United States. The FBI said it received 18,000 cases of sextortion in 2021. The sextortion resulted in a payout of 13.6 million dollars.
The hacker posed as a security employee and tricked her into sharing a code that allowed him to take over the account. He then blocked her out of the account. He then accessed a section called for my eyes only. The woman had stored naked photographs of herself.
He sent the photos to her contacts with the message 'flash me back if we are besties'. This was done as he wanted other people to send their nude photos.
As the authorities couldn't help them, they found a new plan. Yates contacted the victim's account saying she was sending him nudes via a link. The link was in fact software that can identify a person's IP address. As she got to know the person's identity, she reported him to the police.
The man was identified as David Mondore, a 29-year-old chef. He has been sentenced to six months in prison for hacking at least 300 Snapchat accounts.
