Maybe Don't Hire Someone to Hack Into Your Spouse's Email

If you suspect that your spouse or significant other is cheating on you, you have a few methods of recourse: you can drop pointed hints about the deep and awe-inspiring wellspring of righteous anger simmering within your heart (i.e., “I personally think that all cheaters should burn in hell forever, hahaha”) until a resolution is reached; you can confront them directly about your fears; or, if you are someone for whom the concept of “privacy” is a hollow, meaningless word, you might consider hiring some hackers to get you into their email account.

UGH, nevermind, turns out the third option is illegal! Who would have guessed? Well, um, the FBI, for one — according to Mother Jones, federal prosecutors recently arrested two Arkansas men, Mark Anthony Townsend and Joshua Alan Tabor, for operating a website called “needapassword.com” (now accessible here) that illegally obtained email passwords for jealous humans hoping to catch their spouse or significant other emailing boob pix or racy Elf Yourselves, or whatever one does when conducting an affair over Gmail. Over 6,000 people utilized their services, netting them $150,000 over the course of a year and a half. Hooray for the benevolence of the human spirit!

Townsend and Tabor’s services ranged from $50 – $350; according to the Daily Dot, the duo hunted down the elusive Spouse Passwords by sending a fake email to account-owners in order to trick them into providing sensitive information — meaning that their potential targets were not only potentially deceitful, but also probably computer-illiterate. I feel like there must be a lot of less expensive ways to catch a cheater who knows that little about how not to give your password to strangers.

“You have the right to KNOW THE TRUTH!” proclaims needapassword.com. “Relationships must be open and honest to be successful. If your spouse or loved one is hiding emails, chats, and websites visited, then you need to find out why!” Probably the only thing less “open and honest” than conducting a secret affair is paying a guy in Arkansas to phish your boyfriend’s email account, but oh well.