Ex-Yahoo employee admits hacking into women's accounts to steal sex videos
Apple is offering hackers up to $1 million to find vulnerabilities in its products.
An ex-software engineer for Yahoo admitted to hacking into thousands of users’ accounts in search of sexually explicit videos and pictures, mostly from younger women.
Reyes Daniel Ruiz pleaded guilty to one count of computer intrusion in the hacks, which targeted about 6,000 Yahoo accounts, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Francisco.
The 34-year-old Tracy, California resident abused access obtained through his job as a software engineer in the break-ins, prosecutors said. Among the people Ruiz targeted were friends and co-workers, officials said; after copying the files, he would save and store them for later viewing.
His intrusion was not limited to Yahoo, authorities said. Ruiz admitted to compromising the iCloud, Facebook, Gmail, DropBox and other online accounts of Yahoo users in search of more explicit viewing, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
It's not the first time Yahoo, which is owned by Verizon, has been compromised. The Internet company was previously ordered to pay $117.5 million in the wake of a data breach that affected early 200 million people.
A Yahoo spokesperson didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from FOX Business.
Ruiz destroyed his computer and hard drive after his employer learned what he was doing, prosecutors said. He is due to be sentenced in February 2020 and faces a maximum of five years behind bars and a $250,000 fine.