"Cracked" was near the center of the 2001 anthrax scare. An anonymous letter containing anthrax powder was sent to American Media Inc. in September 2001, killing one employee. "Cracked"s offices were still in the same building, and thus the magazine was among the publications that had to be evacuated. As a consequence, the company's archives, containing the magazine's original photographic prints of issues from 1958–2000, had to be destroyed due to contamination. The attack caused Kulpa to put out only four issues that year.