American cybersecurity activist Jacob Appelbaum, now under scrutiny by U.S. law enforcement, speaks at a 2014 conference on digital society in Berlin. (Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

A top online-anonymity service, a renowned hacker collective and a privacy organization employing Edward Snowden all recently broke ties with security researcher Jacob Appelbaum amid numerous allegations of sexual harassment and assault.

Appelbaum, 33, is an outspoken privacy activist and confidant of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Rolling Stone dubbed him “the American WikiLeaks hacker” in 2010, a few months after Appelbaum filled in for Assange at the HOPE hacker conference, where Appelbaum gave a speech supporting Army private Bradley (now Chelsea) Manning’s leak of more than 700,000 classified U.S. documents to WikiLeaks. In 2013, Appelbaum vetted NSA contractor Edward Snowden for journalist Laura Poitras. He then worked with Poitras at Der Spiegel, where they pored over documents provided by Snowden.

On Saturday, the Tor Project, a nonprofit that maintains software for the anonymous-communication Tor web browser, announced Appelbaum’s resignation. Executive director Shari Steele wrote that Appelbaum, who had worked for Tor as a developer since 2004, stepped down after the nonprofit learned of “sexual mistreatment” allegations that were “consistent with rumors some of us had been hearing for some time.” Steele added that “the most recent allegations are much more serious and concrete than anything we had heard previously.”

This may have been a reference to a website where pseudonymous users allege that Appelbaum committed sexual assaults and intimidated victims from speaking out.

Appelbaum denied all of the allegations, issuing a lengthy statement calling them part of a plot to smear him. “Vague rumors and smear campaigns against me are nothing new,” Appelbaum wrote. “As a longtime public advocate for free speech and a secure internet, there have been plenty of attempts to undermine my work over the years.”

Appelbaum further claimed that he was the “target of a fake website in my name that has falsely accused me of serious crimes” and was “prepared to use legal channels, if necessary, to defend my reputation from these libelous accusations.”

View photos U.S. journalist and internet activist Jacob Appelbaum at a demonstration in support of freedom of press on August 1, 2015, in Berlin. (Photo: Britta Pedersen/AFP) More

Two Tor staffers, Andrea Shepard and Alison Macrina, said they spoke to some of the people who accused Appelbaum on the website and vouched for their stories.

“[The website is] related to something that started happening in earnest about three or four months ago,” Macrina told the Daily Dot. “People stopped being afraid to talk to each other about Jake. That’s how I heard from some victims.”

Security engineer Leigh Honeywell, who said she was sexually involved with Appelbaum in 2006 and 2007, publicly detailed alleged abuse by Appelbaum. Honeywell wrote that he “violated boundaries I set as though they were a game, particularly at times when I was intoxicated. There were a number of times I felt afraid and violated during interactions with Jacob.”

Other members of the information activist community acknowledged that Appelbaum’s alleged behavior had been an open secret. “This isn’t new or recent behavior.” Violet Blue, a journalist who said she has known Appelbaum since 2005, tweeted. “Many of us are just surprised it took this long to come out.”

Jake hated and threatened me because I wouldn't fuck him, and his humiliation/bullying tactics didn't work to make me give in. And because – — Violet Blue ® (@violetblue) June 8, 2016





-because I physically stopped him from harassing/trying to isolate and fuck a frightened female friend at a party. He was furious. — Violet Blue ® (@violetblue) June 8, 2016





Asher Wolf, an Australia-based information activist who previously worked with WikiLeaks and organized events to teach people how to use Tor, told Yahoo News: “There were whispers [about Appelbaum’s inappropriate conduct] for years. But it was only last year I heard allegations directly from people. The thing that is problematic is finding a way to work on [sexual assault] issues. It’s a community that often distrusts law enforcement.”

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