John Randall Meneses of Las Vegas has been identified as the creator of the now infamous subreddit on Reddit that helped spread the hundreds of leaked pictures and videos after they emerged earlier this month.
Meneses, 33, ran The Fappening subreddit, which focused primarily on posting links to the pictures as new ones came out.
Users on the forum also tried to determine the identity of women in pictures that lacked definitive identifying characteristics. Bar Refaeli and Hillary Duff are two women who were identified by some users as women in such pictures.
The Fappening was eventually banned by Reddit, with Meneses saying that he was unclear why the ban happened.
“While I didn’t intend for it to be the fastest growing sub in history, it was. I want to point out that our mod team worked their asses off to ensure that pics that violated reddit’s rules were removed,” he told fellow Reddit users.
“And we prevented the doxx of the ‘leaker’ as well. I know we aren’t going to be considered the good guys, but we worked hard to ensure reddit’s rules were followed.”
Meneses’ full name was published by the Daily Mail tabloid after previous stories referenced him without disclosing his full name, including one from the Washington Post that many Reddit users labeled as “a hit piece.”
Meneses told the Mail in response to inquiries: 'If people want to call me a hero or a cyber warrior then I’m not going to stop them.”
“I’ve done nothing wrong,” he added.
His only regret is posting the pictures online under his own username and not an anonymous account.
