The US 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 identification theft.
This case has raised eyebrows as a consequence of its potential connection to the 2022 FTX hack, the place the crypto alternate suffered a big $400 million loss across the interval it declared chapter. Preliminary suspicions pointed in the direction of the opportunity of an insider job, with founder Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) even going through 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 getting 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 latest actions of the stolen crypto assets might point out they’re not within the possession of the accused trio.
FTX chapter managers have but to answer CryptoSlate’s request for remark as of press time.
This indictment emerges at a time when sim swap assaults are on the rise, primarily concentrating on distinguished entities inside the cryptocurrency house. Risk actors use these assaults to take advantage of social media accounts to advertise phishing campaigns.
“It’s 2024 and we’re nonetheless seeing far too many groups getting SIM swapped or phished frequently leading to tens of millions stolen,” blockchain investigator ZachXBT mentioned.
Extra not too long ago, the U.S. Securities and Change Fee (SEC) skilled a sim-swap incident, resulting in an exploit on its X account simply final month.
