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The FBI had a big break when it arrested Christopher Chaney for hacking into the e-mails of Scarlett Johansson, Mila Kunis and Christina Aguilera, but now it appears that he's far from alone in doing the exact same thing.
The FBI has said that Chaney acted as a lone wolf in his activities and the interviews that Chaney have given since his public outing as a celebrity hacker corroborated that. Chaney said he treated the forwarded e-mails from celebrity accounts as a kind of unfiltered gossip blog. He said he never wanted to blackmail anyone and when he got into it, he never intended to release pictures.
"It started as curiosity and it turned to just being addictive," Chaney told WTEV, a local Fox News affiliate. "Seeing the behind-the-scenes of what's going on with the people you see on the big screen."
In that same interview, Chaney said that someone else — another hacker — found his personal e-mail and asked him for the pictures.
"I don't know how my email got a hold of, someone contacted me wanting the pictures," said Chaney. "I don't even know who it was. No, I didn't give that person any pictures. I never wanted to sell or release any images."
TMZ has also heard from quite a few more hackers who weren't Chaney. One hacker told TMZ two years ago that he wanted to take Chaney down. Some of them claimed to have hacked their way into the same e-mail accounts as Chaney, including Scarlett Johansson's. Another hacker sent TMZ pictures of Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis (which it says they never published).
All of this suggests that this hackerazzi case may not have fully unraveled.
Chaney told WTEV that he plans to plead guilty to all charges, which could land him in prison for 121 years. His final sentencing could be very different. As a point of reference, a convicted cyber "sextortionist" in Santa Ana who hacked into the e-mails and computers of more than 100 women, released nude pictures, blackmailed and extorted them was sentenced to six years in prison — and the judge considered that sentence stiff enough to send a message about the seriousness of cyber offenses.
