One year ago today, MSNBC host Joy Reid revealed that she was the victim of a malicious hacker who planted fake homophobic, Islamaphobic, and fat-shaming posts on her blog.
"In December I learned that an unknown, external party accessed and manipulated material from my now-defunct blog, The Reid Report, to include offensive and hateful references that are fabricated and run counter to my personal beliefs and ideology," she told Mediaite.
"I began working with a cyber-security expert who first identified the unauthorized activity, and we notified federal law enforcement officials of the breach. The manipulated material seems to be part of an effort to taint my character with false information by distorting a blog that ended a decade ago."
The hacking was the perfect crime. At first people insisted that it couldn't have possibly been a hacker, since Reid's posts appear to have had homophobic content when they were captured by the Internet Archive a decade ago. The ignorant swine of Twitter insisted that Reid must be lying.
But the cyber security expert Reid hired explained everything to the Daily Beast: the hacker infiltrated her website a decade ago, posted fake posts alongside Reid's legitimate posts, sometimes changed headlines and added entries to a liveblog as Reid herself was updating it, all without Reid ever noticing, over the span of several years.
So perfect was the hackers' impersonation of Reid, they successfully tricked the MSNBC host into initially apologizing and admitting it was her. "Re-reading those old blog posts, I am disappointed in myself. I apologize to those who also are disappointed in me," she said in December 2017. It wasn't until even worse, potentially firing-worthy content emerged months later that Reid to came to her senses and realized she was a hacking victim.
Joy Reid's hacker has remained prolific. He (or she, women👏🏽can👏🏽 be👏🏽 hackers👏🏽 too) is also likely the one who snuck into the gym where Anderson Cooper's assistant was working out and sent a tweet calling the president a "pathetic loser." They hacked distinguished NYU professor Lauren Duca's email and made her call her coworker fat. They hacked a journalist at, no joke, "Cheese Reporter" and sent an email saying they hoped a Republican press staffer would get raped. I too have been victimized; just weeks ago, they took control of my phone at 2 AM on a Saturday and began texting my exes.
Why hasn't the FBI done anything yet? Unfortunately, the bureau typically does not comment on ongoing investigations. For that matter, Reid's lawyer's statement a year ago indicating that the matter had been referred to the FBI is the only indication that the investigation even exists. But for the past year, Reid and her lawyer have provided no updates, no doubt out of silent frustration.
I shot Reid's attorney an email last Thursday asking about the progress of the FBI investigation and initially got no response. I followed up Monday, asking if the reason he wasn't responding was because he was also hacked. I immediately received a reply reading "I will be overseas until Monday 4/29 with much delayed access to email."
Really? If his access to email was "much delayed," why did I receive an email almost immediately? He even made the subject line "Automatic reply" to emphasis his speediness. I believe my suspicion is correct; Reid's hacker is so bold, he's even controlling her attorney's email. When will it end? When, I ask?