LOS ANGELES – Federal authorities this morning arrested a Los Angeles man on federal charges that allege he targeted seven women with online threats to publish nude photos unless the victims provided him with additional explicit pictures.

          Richard Gregory Bauer, 28, a former contractor at NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center, and who used several aliases including “Steve Smith,” “John Smith,” and “Garret,” was arrested by special agents with NASA’s Office of Inspector General.

          Bauer was arrested at his Mid-Wilshire residence without incident pursuant to a 14-count indictment returned by a federal grand jury on August 28. The indictment charges Bauer with stalking, unauthorized access to a protected computer, and aggravated identity theft.

          The indictment alleges that over the past several years, Bauer, who until recently lived in the High Desert communities of Palmdale and Lancaster, harassed the victims on Facebook and through emails. In the communications in which Bauer masked his identity, Bauer claimed to possess nude photos of the victims, which he did in relation to six of the seven victims discussed in the indictment. Bauer sent the victims nude photos of themselves, claimed to have additional photos, and threatened to post the nude photos of the victims online unless the women sent him additional photos in various stages of undress.

          Bauer is also charged in the indictment with unauthorized access to computers and accounts owned by victims. During the course of the alleged stalking, according to the indictment, Bauer, using his true identity, contacted some victims on Facebook and posed a series of questions, purportedly as part of a project he was working on for his “human societies class.” Some of the questions included typical questions used to reset online passwords, such as the name of your first pet or the city where your parents met.

          In other instances, again using his true identity, Bauer allegedly convinced victims to install malware by claiming that he needed the victims’ help in testing software he claimed to have written. The malware gave Bauer unauthorized access to the computers, and allowed him, among other things, to capture from the victims’ computers passwords for web sites and e-mail accounts. On at least two instances, Bauer is alleged to have used logins and passwords belonging to victims to log on to their Facebook and Google email accounts.

          Bauer is expected to be arraigned on the indictment this afternoon in United States District Court in downtown Los Angeles.

          An indictment contains allegations that a defendant has committed a crime. Every defendant is presumed to be innocent until and unless proven guilty in court.

          If convicted of the 14 charges in the indictment, Bauer would face a statutory maximum sentence of 64 years in federal prison.

          This case is the result of an ongoing investigation being conducted by NASA’s Office of Inspector General. Members of the public who have information about Bauer’s online activities or believe they may be victims of his activities are encouraged to contact NASA OIG Special Agent Joseph Bennett at (818) 354-9768.

          This matter is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Khaldoun Shobaki of the Cyber and Intellectual Property Crimes Section.

          LOS ANGELES – A former NASA contractor was sentenced today to 57 months in federal prison for hacking into the email, social media accounts and computers of women he knew and then using the information, including nude photographs of the women, to anonymously threaten and harass them for additional explicit pictures.

          Richard Gregory Bauer, 28, who resides in the Mid-Wilshire district of Los Angeles, was sentenced by United States District Judge John F. Walter, who called the crimes “disgusting and harmful.”

          Bauer pleaded guilty in October to federal charges of stalking, computer hacking and aggravated identity theft. In a plea agreement filed in this case, Bauer admitted that he spent years obtaining unauthorized access to the online accounts of his victims, who included family, friends, high school and college acquaintances, co-workers and friends of friends.

          Bauer’s “crimes represent a long-running course of behavior, not a one-off event, or for that matter a brief spree,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

          Starting in early 2015 and continuing through early 2018, Bauer sent his victims anonymous online messages that threatened to publish their nude photographs on the Internet or to the victims’ family and co-workers if they did not send him additional explicit pictures of themselves. As part of the threats, Bauer included in his emails details that made it clear he knew about his victims’ lives, work and families, according to the sentencing memorandum.

          Bauer targeted his victims using two methods. In some cases, he used his true identity and contacted victims on Facebook, posing a series of questions purportedly as part of a “human societies” project he claimed he was working on for a class. Some of the questions included ones frequently used to reset online passwords, including the name of the city where your parents met, the name of your first pet, or the brand and model of your first car. In reality, there was no class and Bauer then used the information he obtained to reset passwords, and to gain access to his victims’ online accounts, primarily cloud-based iPhone backups. From those backups, he gathered his victims’ photographs, videos and documents containing passwords for their other accounts.

          Other times, Bauer again used his true identity and convinced his victims to install malware that he claimed was software he had written and needed help testing. Once the malware had been installed on the victims’ computers, Bauer used it to harvest account logins, passwords, photographs and videos from his victims’ compromised computers.

          Bauer is a former contractor at NASA’s Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center, an aeronautical research center located at Edwards Air Force Base. He is a former resident of the High Desert communities of Lancaster and Palmdale.

          This case was investigated by NASA’s Office of Inspector General.

          This matter was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Khaldoun Shobaki of the Cyber and Intellectual Property Crimes Section.