Lana Del Rey on Wednesday begged fans not to listen to unreleased music she says was ripped from her cell phone along with unspecified personal photos this week.
The singer, whose real name is Elizabeth Grant, said in a video posted to her private Instagram account and later shared by a third party on Twitter that the leak appears to be related to the theft of her personal laptop earlier this year.
“A few months ago, I parked my car on Melrose Place and I stepped away for a minute. And the one time I left my backpack inside my car, someone broke all of the windows and took it and inside of it was my computer and my three camcorders and my hard drives,” she said.
Del Rey said she “had to remotely wipe the computer that had my 200 page book,” written as part of her deal with Simon & Schuster. She said she doesn’t use “any cloud systems,” but that as a result of accessing her laptop, someone was able “to remotely access my phone” and pilfer the unreleased music and some “personal photos.”
Del Rey explained that she does not “really like to share things that are going not to plan” and reiterated her well-known desire for privacy on social media. “Please don’t listen to the music if you hear it, because it’s not coming out yet,” she added.
She also expressed concerns about how difficult digital security has been for her. “I just want to bring it to light that it is hard and there’s really nothing to be done. I can’t really make my devices any safer,” she said.