Man Used Mega and Protonmail to Download and Share Child Abuse Pictures : DeepDotWeb | Torhoo darknet markets

Posted by: C. Aliens October 12, 2018

In a statement to the press, United States Attorney Andrew E. Lelling announced the arrest of an employee of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra for one count of possession of child pornography and one count of of receipt of child pornography. The suspected pedophile had been downloading child abuse content from darkweb sites and uploading the pictures to an encrypted storage account on the internet.

In a criminal complaint, Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Janet Connolly explained that in May 2018, Homeland Security Cyber Crimes Center (C3) sent information about a specific Mega.nz folder to the Homeland Security Investigations Boston Cyber Crime and Child Exploitation Group. HSI C3 reported that the Kent Police had been conducting their own investigation into child pornography distributors on the internet when they discovered a Mega folder and account that contained more than 5,000 pictures and videos depicting various forms of child sexual abuse. Kent Police, prior to sending information to Homeland Security Investigations, gathered vital information about the account’s owner.

Kent Police then reached out to Mega Limited and requested the email address of the Mega account used to create the shared folder. Mega Limited provided Kent Police with the Protonmail email address “still_a_boy@protonmail.com” and two IP addresses associated with the account. One IP address linked to the account creation and a second IP address the account holder had used to create and share the Mega folder.

Both HSI C3 and Special Agent Janet Connolly issued summons to Verizon Internet Services and requested subscriber information associated with the two IP addresses provided by Kent Police. Unsurprisingly, both HSI C3 and Special Agent Janet Connolly received the same results from Verizon. The account belonged to a resident of Arlington, Massachusetts, named David St. George. The Special Agent then reached back out to Kent Police and requested access logs that Mega had given them. Mega Limited informed both parties that the account owner had deleted the folder on April 5, 2018. The company still had ample account access logs to provide, though.

The Special Agent learned that the account holder used the Firefox web browser on a Windows computer and occasionally accessed Mega via a proxy but primarily accessed his account using the same IP addresses that Mega had previously provided. HSI Boston Special Agent Andrew Kelleher obtained the driver’s license information associated with David St. George and learned that he was 71-years-old.

Special Agent Janet Connolly performed open source queries for results associated with the name “David St. George” and learned that the man was an employee at the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra and the Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. The criminal complaint included several excerpts from blog posts on the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra’s blog that identified the suspect as someone who “has built a close personal relationship with the members of the BPYO through his attendance at … weekly rehearsals, where he frequently intercedes with his insights and coaching.” The Special Agent pointed out that the 71-year-old frequently wrote blog posts on the site about his time observing children at the Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra.

In September 2018, Homeland Security Investigations and an Arlington Police Detective confirmed that the suspect lived at the address provided by Verizon. On September 21, a judge issued a search and seizure warrant for David St. George’s property and his person. Homeland Security Investigations personnel then raided the house while David St. George remained inside. An agent read the man his Miranda rights and St. George confirmed in writing that he understood his rights. He then waived his rights and agreed to talk to the agents.

In his statement to the agents in his home, St. George admitted that he was a “feverish and crazed” hoarder of illegal child abuse content. He admitted that the Mega account and the Protonmail address belonged to him. He then explained that he had several more accounts including three extra Protonmail accounts that he accessed over Tor. He explained that he used Tor to access darkweb sites that allowed him to download massive amounts of content. He pulled out a 512 GB USB drive filled with similar illegal content. Agents searching the house also found a series of three ring binders filled with screenshots taken from videos stored on the USB drive.

St. George is currently in custody and the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra is hastily deleting any references to him on their websites. He has been suspended pending the outcome of the case. If convicted of possession of child pornography, St. George faces a mandatory minimum of five years in prison.

CLEARNET: https://www.deepdotweb.com/2018/10/12/man-used-mega-and-protonmail-to-download-and-share-child-abuse-pictures/