Judge gives Ariana Grande permission to unmask hackers

A judge in Los Angeles has given Ariana Grande permission to fast track legal information requests to several platforms so she can identify anonymous hackers who allegedly stole and sold her unreleased music and private images. Judge Mark H. Epstein of the Los Angeles County Superior Court approved the request for what is known as expedited discovery, allowing Grande to bypass the standard 20 day waiting period in the legal process.

The judge explained his decision by noting that the waiting period could never realistically run in this case, simply because Grande cannot identify the defendants and therefore cannot officially serve them with legal notice. "The 20 day waiting period will never run because plaintiff cannot, even with reasonable diligence, determine the defendant's identity without this discovery, and therefore will never be able to serve defendants," Epstein wrote in his ruling, which was reviewed by Rolling Stone.

Grande originally filed her privacy lawsuit on July 27. According to her legal team, the hackers managed to gain access to the personal digital accounts and devices of her photographers and producers through stolen login credentials and phishing schemes. This gave them access to unreleased masters, demo recordings, and footage from recording sessions. The stolen material was then reportedly resold for significant sums via the dark web.

The scale of the theft is striking. In 2023 alone, 45 unreleased songs Grande had been working on were allegedly stolen and leaked. Her legal team also claims that hundreds of similar leaks have occurred since her musical debut in 2011, resulting in what they describe as irreversible damage. The stolen material surfaced on platforms including Twitter, Instagram, Discord, TikTok, YouTube, WeTransfer, and Dropbox, as well as through lesser known file sharing services.

In her filing, Grande stresses that urgency is critical, as any delay increases the risk of additional material being stolen or sold, and that the account and login information needed to identify the perpetrators could disappear in the meantime. The hackers are deliberately making the investigation harder by using multiple pseudonymous accounts across various platforms, mimicking domain names, and processing transactions through peer to peer payment platforms that do not share public information about their users. With the court's approval, Grande can now send targeted information requests to those platforms in hopes of unmasking the people responsible.