What do you do when you’re an engineer and you’re horny. Go into users accounts looking for sexual photos and videos. That’s what this former Yahoo engineer did.
34-year-old Reyes Daniel Ruiza pleaded guilty to hacking into 6000 Yahoo users accounts searching for sexual photos and videos. He admitted that he targeted younger women’s’ accounts that included his workmates and friends.
Prosecutors in the US Attorney’s Office say once he gained access to the accounts, he got into their Gmail, Facebook, iCloud and other online services in his search for nudes.
The engineer stored the explicit images and videos on a private computer he later destroyed when his employer noticed the suspicious behaviour. He left the company in 2018 when internal investigations by Yahoo began.
The engineer who is from Tracy, a city in Northern California pleaded guilty to one count of computer intrusion and he faces 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 when he’ll be sentenced in 3rd February.
Yahoo which is now a Verizon subsidiary has had huge privacy breaches in previous years. The company announced in 2016 that over 3 billion accounts were affected in the massive breach that happened in 2013.
