Ted Kaczynski, a former math professor who became known as the Unabomber when he led a series of mysterious bombings over a 17-year period that killed three people and rocked the FBI, died on Saturday at the age of 81, Reuters reported

Ted Kaczynski, nicknamed the Unabomber, was found dead in his cellPhoto: John Youngbear/AP/Profimedia

Kaczynski, who made and shipped many of his bombs while living in a primitive shack without running water in rural Montana, was found dead in a North Carolina prison.

Christy Breshears, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons, confirmed the death to Reuters.

“He’s dead,” said Breshears. “He was found unconscious in his cell early this morning.”

The Harvard graduate, a loner as a child, attacked academics, scientists and computer store owners and even tried to blow up a commercial airliner in a series of attacks on what he saw as evil modern technology between 1978 and 1995.

For years he frustrated the police, who, with no firm evidence of the killer’s identity, christened the investigation “UNABOM” into his university and aircraft bombings.

A step forward in the investigation was made when Kaczynski released an incoherent 35,000-word manifesto titled “Industrial Society and Its Future,” which was released to the media in September 1995.

Kaczynski’s younger brother, David, told police that the author’s ideas were similar to Ted’s.

Agents arrested the Unabomber at his cabin in April 1996.