EU's Digital Head Refuses To Apologise For Saying Celebrities Who Took Nude Pictures That Got Leaked Were 'Dumb'

The EU's next digital head has refused to apologise for saying celebrities were "dumb" for taking intimate pictures that were later leaked.




Günther Oettinger was highly criticised for comments including: "Stupidity is something you can only partly save people from."



He will become the EU's digital economy and society commissioner in November.



One MEP, Julia Reda, laid into the
commissioner: "The statement is unbelievable," she said.




In a blog post, Ms Reda – who represents the Pirate Party – said: "The person applying to be in charge of shoring up trust in the internet so that Europeans do more business online, just blamed people whose personal data was accessed and spread without authorisation.


"He placed the moral blame for that crime squarely on the victims rather than the perpetrators."



Ms Reda posted a video of the meeting on YouTube.




When asked by the BBC to clarify his comments, Mr Oettinger said: "Everybody has a right to privacy. The EU Commission wants to make
cloud computing safer."


Asked if he would like to apologise for, or expand on, his comments, Mr Oettinger's spokeswoman told the BBC: "No."



Mr Oettinger was speaking during a meeting in Brussels on Monday. He was referring to the leak of intimate pictures featuring more than 80 famous women, including actress Jennifer Lawrence and pop star Rihanna.



Members of the 4Chan message board first posted the images, which appeared to have been obtained by accessing private cloud
storage accounts.


Before making the comments Mr Oettinger said he was being "semi-serious".


After hesitating, he went on to say: "The fact that recently there have been an increasing number of public lamentations about nude photos of
celebrities who took selfies – I just can't believe it.