'Revenge Porn' Pioneer Hunter Moore Indicted by Fed Grand Jury

LOS ANGELES—Over the past few years, the ugly phenomenon known as "revenge porn" has become a sort of national obsession, playing as it does on the worst elements of both human nature and the internet, and instigating an inevitable public backlash that is now resulting in efforts to draft laws at the state level to deal with the miscreants who decide to start their own "revenge porn" sites. But it was only a few years ago that one guy had all but cornered the market on a business model that ultimately earned him the label, courtesy of Rolling Stone, as “the most hated man on the internet." That same man was just indicted by a federal grand jury. "Hunter Moore... was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury, according to an official at the United States Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles," Time magazine reported today. As Time also noted, and AVN has previously covered, this is hardly the first investigative or legal rodeo for Hunter. The FBI was looking into his operation by May of 2012, and in March of last year, "A judge ordered he pay $250,000 to Bullyville.com founder James McGibney for defamation damages." He also was sued by Storage Wars reality star Brandi Passante in October of 2012 for posting up a sex video that was promoted as featuring her, and for also sending it to Fleshbot, which also posted it online. The current indictment contains allegations of conduct that include a conspiracy to hack into the email accounts of unsuspecting women for the sole purpose of obtaining nude photos and personal identifying information that would then be posted to Moore's notorious site, isanyoneup.com. The alleged conspiracy was itself exposed by way of emails between Moore and his alleged co-conspirator, Charles "Gary" Evens. "The indictment from the United States District Court for the Central District of California charges Moore and... Evens, 25, with conspiracy to 'access a protected computer without authorization to obtain information for private financial gain' and other counts," reported Time, which added that the men "are scheduled to appear in court Tuesday afternoon—Moore in federal court in Sacramento and Evens in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles." The pair were also charged with seven counts of aggravated identity theft. Interestingly, although the nude and sometimes sexually-explicit photos and videos were posted on the internet without labels identifying the person/company doing the posting, nor any clue as to where the person's/company's records containing the subjects' photo IDs could be found, nor who their custodian would be, Moore and Evens were apparently not charged with any violations of the federal record-keeping and labeling law, 18 U.S.C. §2257. Apparently, such charges are reserved for adult production companies that deal with porn made by, with and for consenting adults! Needless to say, Moore's victims are thrilled with the indictment, which was a long time coming considering the acts the two are being charged with committing had all but ended, according to the indictment, by May 2012. The legacy of pain created by these sites is indicated by the emotions that exist to this day. “We’re ecstatic,” Time quoted revenge porn activist Charlotte Laws, whose daughter Kayla is one of the victims listed in the indictment as saying. “We’re super pleased that the FBI have brought this to fruition. I’ve talked to several of the victims and they are extremely pleased and I know all the victims are going to feel happy and they are going to feel that finally justice is being served.” The indictment can be read at the end of the article here. Image: Hunter Moore and revelers back in the day.