Hacker behind iCloud celebrity nudes incident sentenced to 18 months in prison

Jennifer Lawrence was one of the victims of the celebrity phishing attack

The hacker who gained access to numerous celebrity iCloud accounts in order to obtain nude photos has been sentenced to 18 months in prison in a plea bargain deal.

The leak of nude photos of a number of celebrities was initially labelled an iCloud hack. We suspected at the time that it was in fact a combination of phishing and guessing the answers to security questions, and this was soon confirmed by Apple.

Ryan Collins was formally charged back in March with a felony violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Although Collins pled guilty to unauthorised account access, there was no evidence linking him to the leaks of the photos.

The Guardian reports that the FBI has prosecuted two other men for similar but unrelated offences, each – like Collins – pleading guilty.