The USA Division of Justice (DOJ) has taken authorized motion towards three people—Robert Powell, Carter Rohn, and Emily Hernandez—for his or her involvement in a Sim-swapping rip-off in November 2022. The fees introduced towards them embrace fraud and id theft.
This case has raised eyebrows on account of its potential connection to the 2022 FTX hack, the place the crypto trade suffered a big $400 million loss across the interval it declared chapter. Preliminary suspicions pointed in direction of the potential of an insider job, with founder Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) even dealing with accusations.
The indictment reveals that Powell, Rohn, and Hernandez obtained private data from roughly 50 people. Subsequently, they manipulated service suppliers into transferring the victims’ particulars to their very own gadgets. Armed with this data, the trio accessed authentication codes for monetary accounts and crypto wallets.
Notably, Hernandez employed a pretend ID belonging to an FTX worker to impersonate the person at AT&T, efficiently having access to their account. This transfer allowed them to acquire verification codes for accessing FTX’s crypto wallets and transferring over $400 million in digital property.
Whereas the indictment didn’t explicitly point out FTX, it highlighted that the $400 million theft happened between November 11 and 12, 2022—coinciding with the timeline of the FTX incident.
Blockchain analytical agency Elliptic said that “FTX is [likely] the ‘Sufferer Firm-1′” named within the indictment, including that the current actions of the stolen crypto assets could point out they’re now not within the possession of the accused trio.
FTX chapter managers have but to reply to CryptoSlate’s request for remark as of press time.
This indictment emerges at a time when sim swap assaults are on the rise, primarily focusing on distinguished entities inside the cryptocurrency area. Risk actors use these assaults to use social media accounts to advertise phishing campaigns.
“It’s 2024 and we’re nonetheless seeing far too many groups getting SIM swapped or phished regularly leading to hundreds of thousands stolen,” blockchain investigator ZachXBT mentioned.
Extra not too long ago, the U.S. Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC) skilled a sim-swap incident, resulting in an exploit on its X account simply final month.
