FBI arrests alleged Scarlett Johansson e-mail hacker

October 12, 2011 By Mike Flacy

After nude photographs of Scarlett Johansson were plastered all over the Internet last month, officials with the FBI have arrested the man allegedly responsible for hacking Ms. Johansson's email account and accessing the photos.

Taken into custody earlier today, 35-year-old Christopher Chaney of Jacksonville, Florida was arrested for hacking into the email account of Scarlett Johansson and distributing nude photos that the actress had taken of herself. The FBI was called into investigate this crime in September 2011. This arrest was related to an 11-month investigation that the FBI are calling ”Operation Hackerazzi”. Federal authorities also identified fifty more celebrity victims of Chaney, but only identified Christina Aguilera, Mila Kunis, Simone Harouche and Renee Olstead as they agreed to public identification. Six more victims were only identified by their initials which included B.G., B.P., D.F., J.A., L.B. and L.S.

To gain access to these email accounts, Chaney would search through details of celebrity lives within magazines as well as social media accounts like Twitter and figure out possible passwords. Once Chaney cracked the password, he would setup email forwarding to send a duplicate version of all emails to his personal account. This allowed Chaney to continue receiving emails after the password was reset. Gaining access to one account also allowed Chaney to access the address book and discover more celebrity email addresses. Chaney faces 26 counts of identity theft, unauthorized access to a protected computer and wiretapping. If convicted on all counts, Chaney could receive 121 years in prison for his crimes.

In the case of Scarlett Johansson’s nude photos, Chaney distributed the photos to celebrity blog sites, but made no attempt to sell the photos. He also made attempts to distribute more private celebrity information to the same blogs, but this information hasn’t been identified yet. Chaney was released on a $10,000 bond earlier today, but several restrictions are in place for the hacker. Chaney isn’t allowed access to any computer or other device with Internet access and travel is restricted to the Middle District of Florida and Central District of California for trial purposes.

Showing 17 comments

jesterking at 8:46am 13th October 2011 Two things:1.) this man is a hero 2.) this only proves that if you are rich, famous, and beautiful, the FBI will do everything in their power to help you. My email account was hacked, along with my paypal account (which was used to buy an $800 item) and the FBI basically said: "Sorry, your sol". just love it.
Mike Dunn at 7:03am 13th October 2011 Pretty impressive to me that he was able to guess the passwords. I have a hard enough time remembering my own password let alone those of several others.
Robert Burnham at 6:30am 13th October 2011 Those pictures can only serve to help her career. Before seeing them I thought she was kind of overrated and had a bit of a pretty, yet dull face. I am completely turned around on her and will go see all of her movies, even the crappy ones. Which is most of them.
Rich Hansell at 9:18am 13th October 2011 I feel so much safer now..
Mehmet Iyikan at 9:14am 13th October 2011 aaaaaa
Justin Miranda at 6:35am 13th October 2011 The FBI should be worried more about nationa security rather than who the fuck hacked Scarlett Johansson's email.. seriously...
1. Ernest Sarange at 1:57am 13th October 2011 LOL SO right
llbbl at 10:48pm 12th October 2011 Christopher Chaney you name will go down in history as a god among men.
1. llbbl at 10:49pm 12th October 2011 your*
Philip Palmer at 5:31am 13th October 2011 Damn. Scarlett Johansson's reps should have pulled a Blake Lively and denied that they were her so they would have leaked more out.
Clint Yingling at 5:26am 13th October 2011 it should of read, FBI high fives alleged Scarlett Johansson e-mail hacker.
Tommy Gallagher at 5:23am 13th October 2011 Cases like these are bullshit. Obviously if she took nudies(which by the grace of god I saw) and put them on her email, she wanted SOMEBODY to see them. Yes I know its still an invasion of privacy by hacking her email, but shit, its not too farfetched to believe that it could be hacked. and besides, what is she going to sue them for? she's already fucking loaded, the hacker probably lives in his moms basement.
Paul Mauer at 5:23am 13th October 2011 damn it they found me!
Devan Thayer Lund at 5:21am 13th October 2011 Nice to see where the federal govt's priorities are.
1. Ernest Sarange at 1:55am 13th October 2011 its obvious you're of very little importance to the world. What have you given the world for us to recognize you ?
Christopher Vokey at 5:20am 13th October 2011 Why cant the FBI arrest my email hacker? Oh that's right, i'm not a celebrity!
TechFreak at 10:16pm 12th October 2011 Wow, pretty amazing how the FBI was able to track him down so fast. This only happened recently. It was also clever of him to forward the email to his personal account.