Last month countless nude pictures of female celebrities including athletes, models and actresses were leaked online by unknown hackers. Initially it was believed that they had been hit due to an iCloud breach. Apple’s investigation found there was no breach but the accounts were specifically targeted through brute force attacks. The company then introduced new safety features for iCloud and while it did face severe backlash for the leak its Google that’s now being threatened with a lawsuit by some of the celebrities.
Martin Singer, an attorney based in Los Angeles representing “over a dozen” of the aforementioned athletes, actresses and models, has penned a letter to some of Google’s top executives including CEO Larry Page and Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt accusing the search giant of “making millions and profiting from the victimization of women.” Singer threatens that Google will have “significant liability” with both compensatory and punitive damages to the tune of over $100 million as a result of its “blatantly unethical behavior.”
When the images started spreading online websites such as reddit and Google took action to remove them. Singer claims Google wasn’t so active in playing its part and while takedown notices were sent to Mountain View about a month back the images can still be accessed on Google, including its other properties such as Blogspot and YouTube. Singer appreciated Twitter for its timely action, saying that the microblogging network immediately removed images and suspended offending accounts.
Singer’s letter asks Google to remove images, suspend user accounts and remove Blogspot accounts on which these images are still being displays. He also asks that data on all of these offenders be preserved so that it may come into use for future litigation.
Google has not yet commented on this.