A man who hacked into the cloud storage accounts of two women to steal their explicit photos and videos and post them online has been sentenced to five years in prison, authorities said.
Patrick S. Farrell, 37, of Clarksburg in Millstone Township, was sentenced Thursday in Monmouth County Superior Court on a charge of computer theft, the state Attorney General’s Office announced. He pleaded guilty to the offense in December.
Between October 2015 and April 2016, Farrell hacked into the cloud accounts of two women, downloading sexually explicit videos and photos. In one of the cases, he posted the video and four nude photos of the woman online, and in the other, he shared the woman’s video and photos onto her social media accounts, authorities said.
Neither of the women knew him.
Authorities said Farrell has admitted to hacking 1,000 email accounts during a four-year period to steal photos and personal information, the office said.
“Farrell violated the privacy of his two victims in a devastating way, leaving them fearful and insecure because their most intimate moments were exposed to family members, friends and total strangers,” Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said in a statement. “Beyond the incalculable emotional harm he inflicted, Farrell’s breaches left the information in the victims’ online accounts vulnerable to exploitation by other cybercriminals."
Amanda Hoover can be reached at ahoover@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @amandahoovernj. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
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