Who is James McGibney from The Most Hated Man on the Internet?
The former Marine plays a big role in the downfall of IsAnyoneUp.com – but who is he? Here's everything you need to know about James McGibney.
Netflix docuseries The Most Hated Man on the Internet arrived on the streamer this week, telling the story of how Charlotte Laws set out to take down the 'King of Revenge Porn' Hunter Moore after nude pictures of her daughter were digitally stolen and uploaded to his website, IsAnyoneUp.com.
While the three-parter mainly focuses on former actress and activist Laws and how she assisted the FBI in getting justice for Moore's victims, someone else interviewed for the docuseries is James McGibney – the former Marine who bought IsAnyoneUp.com in order to shut it down.
Here's everything you need to know about James McGibney, what he had to do with Hunter Moore's downfall and where he is now.
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Who is James McGibney?
James McGibney is a former US Marine and entrepreneur who founded BullyVille.com and other sites, but is also known for buying IsAnyoneUp.com from its founder Hunter Moore and shutting it down.
McGibney served in the Marines as part of the Surevillance Reconnaissance Intelligence Group and after leaving, he founded SecuraTrak, a company offering satellite-based tracking to protect against theft or loss.
In 2011, he started the website CheaterVille.com, which allowed anonymous users to post pictures of people accused of cheating along with a story – however, as McGibney realised that "stalkers were posting fake email and text messages about women they were pursing on his site", he shut it down in 2015, according to Wired.
McGibney had also set up other similar sites, such as BullyVille.com in March 2012 which was dedicated to naming and shaming bullies who worked both online and offline, as well as sharing stories by victims. McGibney was bullied as a child, alleging in The Most Hated Man on the Internet that his first interaction with a bully was his father.
"I remember watching him beat the s**t out of mother with a frying pan," he says. "My brother and I were taken out of the house by the New York City police department and I never saw either my mother or my father or my brother ever again."
In an interview with Wired, McGibney alleged that after going into the care system, he was abused by his foster parents, saying: "They were all bad and I think that from that point forward I just had a deep hatred for any adult who was horrible towards kids."
As McGibney says in the documentary, he received a call from Hunter Moore who asked whether he was interested in advertising on IsAnyoneUp.com – Moore's revenge porn website which published nude photographs of people, often without their consent.
"I went to the website and I was appalled by what I saw," McGibney says in the documentary.
He began working with the organisation Anonymous to take down IsAnyoneUp.com, deciding to gain Moore's trust by advertising with him.
"I knew where every server was, I knew every IP address, I knew how many visitors were there and it wasn't long before I discovered what I was looking for," he tells the documentary. "Everything has a digital footprint that's on the internet and that was the vulnerability that I knew I could exploit."
McGibney pointed out to Moore that some of the content on his servers was of underage girls and that it was "just a matter of time" before he'd go to jail, so offered to buy the website off of him.
He bought the domain IsAnyoneUp.com for "less than $15,000" in April 2012 and rerouted it to BullyVille. He also asked Moore to write an open apology letter to his victims that he would post on BullyVille.
In the summer of 2012, Moore took to Twitter to accuse McGibney of being a paedophile and threatening to sexually assault his wife, resulting in McGibney suing him for defamation in February 2013.
In March, the court entered a default judgment against Moore, ordering him to pay $250,000 in damages.
Where is James McGibney now?
James McGibney appears in The Most Hated Man on the Internet as an interviewee, with the activist speaking about how he purchased IsAnyoneUp.com.
In 2015, McGibney and his company ViaView were ordered to pay $1 million for an Anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits against public participation) sanction and $300,000 in lawyer's fees to Neal Rauhauser for filing "baseless" claims in lawsuits against him – however, the ruling was temporarily reversed before being reinstated but reduced from $1m to $150,000 in 2016.
In 2018, McGibney appealed and the sanctions were overturned, with the court determining that the sanctions were unreasonable, according to Texas Lawyer. The case was eventually reversed.
In 2021, McGibney earned a certification in cybersecurity from Harvard University and is currently studying for a Doctorate in Technology.
He has also appeared on shows like ABC Nightline, Maury Povich, Good Morning America, Dr Drew, Dr Phil, Extra! and The View, and recently took part in a Vice documentary about Hunter Moore.
The Most Hated Man on the Internet is available to stream on Netflix now. Looking for more to watch? Check out our TV Guide.
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