On the heels of a $100 million lawsuit threat over a celebrity nude photo hack, Google has released a statement deriding the photo leaks.
"We've removed tens of thousands of pictures — within hours of the requests being made — and we have closed hundreds of accounts," a Google spokesperson said in an email toMashable. "The Internet is used for many good things. Stealing people’s private photos is not one of them."
Lawyer Marty Singer, who says he represents about a dozen famous women affected by the hack, sent a letter to Google, saying it has not done enough to police the circulation of these photos.
"Google is making millions and profiting from the victimization of women," the letter says."Google is making millions and profiting from the victimization of women," the letter says.
The letter demands that Google suspend or terminate YouTube and other Google accounts hosting private celebrity images, as well as remove the images available through search engines, among more terms.
Singer's letter goes on to claim that he has contacted other websites hosting the photos, which have complied with requests for removal. Google, however, has "recklessly allowed these blatant violations to continue in conscious disregard for our clients' rights."
The images began to circulate online Labor Day weekend on sites like 4Chan and a Reddit subgroup called "The Fappening." Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton and Kirsten Dunst are reportedly among the high-profile women whose photos were stolen.
The pictures were supposedly taken from hacked iCloud accounts, and Apple CEO Tim Cook has upped iCloud security in response. The fallout from the photos goes all the way up to theFBI, which — last we heard — was investigating the incident.
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