Newton Man Gets Stiff Prison Sentence For Cyberstalking

A Massachusetts man who engaged in a sophisticated cyberstalking campaign against seven people that included hacking online accounts, sending unsolicited images of child pornography, and 120 hoax bomb threats has been sentenced to more than 17 years in prison.

Federal prosecutors say 25-year-old Ryan Lin was sentenced Wednesday. He pleaded guilty in April.

Prosecutors say the Newton man started by targeting a female housemate, hacking into her online accounts and devices, stealing private information, including photographs and sensitive details about her medical and sexual history, then distributed the material to hundreds of people she knew.

He targeted six other people, in one case creating a false social media profile in someone else's name and posting he was going to "shoot up" a school and there would be "blood and corpses everywhere."