Even though an initial tweet by McKayla Maroney denied the leaked pictures, she later admitted her privacy had been violated and that the pictures were of her. But Reddit, where the pics, along with nude photos of Jennifer Lawrence and Kate Upton and several other stars, were posted is telling users to stop posting Maroney’s alleged pics, because if they are real, she is underage in them.
The Olympic gymnast later thanked her fans for believing her, writing, “shout out to my fans for defending me all day long.. even when things got weird u stood by me. and that meant the world.”
But on Tuesday Reddit sent a message to its users stating: “Effective immediately: any images/galleries/torrents/megadumps/etc containing McKayla Maroney or Liz Lee will be immediately due to the fact that they were underage (<18) in the photos taken." The site said Lee "was not part of the leaks, but people have been posting her images anyways. Liz's pictures were taken in 2007 when she was 16 years old by an ex of hers." The site said images of both would be considered child pornography. Maroney, 18, was a member of the gold-medal winning 2012 US Olympics gymnastics team. The FBI and Apple said Monday they are beginning inquiries into allegations that online accounts of celebrities including Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Lawrence and model Kate Upton were hacked, after naked photos of the stars were posted online. The FBI said in a statement it is "aware" of the hacking allegations and is "addressing the matter." The agency did not say what actions it was taking to investigate who was responsible for posting naked photos. Apple said Monday it was looking into whether its online photo-sharing service, iCloud, had been hacked to obtain the intimate images.
