Disney Slack Hacker Pleads Guilty to Stealing 1.1 Terabytes of Data, Faces Up to 10 Years in Prison

A Santa Clarita man has agreed to plead guilty to two felony counts of hacking the personal computer of a Disney employee last year.

Ryan Mitchell Kramer, 25, will admit to one count of accessing a computer and obtaining information and one count of threatening to damage a protected computer, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Central District of California.

Each count carries a statutory maximum sentence of five years in federal prison, but it’s not clear if those sentences will be served separately or concurrently.

In early 2024, Kramer illegally gained access to the Disney employee’s computer via a program he posted GitHub. It contained a malicious file that enabled Kramer to carry out the hack.

Kramer downloaded approximately 1.1 terabytes of confidential data from thousands of Disney Slack channels, according to the press release.

After unsuccessfully trying to blackmail the hacking victim by claiming to be part of the Russian hacktivist group NullBulge, Kramer publicly released the stolen Disney Slack files. He also posted the victim’s bank, medical, and personal information on multiple online platforms.

The leaked files, which date back to 2019, included discussions about ad campaigns, studio technology and interview candidates, the Wall Street Journal reported last year. Other information obtained in the hack runs the gamut from theme park plans to photos of employees’ dogs.

Kramer posted a statement supposedly from NullBuldge along with the hacked information, saying that Disney was targeted “due to how it handles artist contracts, its approach to AI, and it’s [sic] pretty blatant disregard for the consumer.”

Kramer has admitted that at least two other victims downloaded his malicious program. The FBI is still investigating.

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