DOJ Charges Trio Behind $400 Million SIM Swap Attack on FTX

The United States Department of Justice has charged three people accused of masterminding the SIM-swapping assault that siphoned over $400 million from FTX. The indictment of the trio seems to undercut claims that incarcerated FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was the mastermind behind the hack.

FTX’s Lax Security

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has leveled costs in opposition to three people allegedly concerned in a SIM-swapping gang accountable for siphoning $400 million from the cryptocurrency trade FTX. The heist occurred instantly after FTX filed for chapter. According to an indictment filed in a Washington court docket, the trio illicitly obtained info on 50 victims.

The accused — Robert Powell, Emily Hernandez, and Carter Rohn — then exploited this stolen info to deceive cell phone corporations. By doing so, they managed to reroute the victims’ telephone numbers to a dummy gadget. The indictment of the trio in the meantime seems to undercut claims that incarcerated FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried was the mastermind behind the hack.

Described as a kind of account takeover fraud that typically targets a weak spot in two-factor authentication and two-step verification, SIM-swapping assaults have been on the rise.

In a current report, cybersecurity agency Stroz Friedberg Digital Forensics highlights a regarding pattern — a rise in SIM-swapping assaults throughout numerous industries. Notably, these assaults have of late seemingly focused cryptocurrency and crypto-adjacent corporations

According to the Bloomberg report, the trio focused FTX customers and different crypto entities for 2 years as a result of that they had lax safety. While the Department of Justice (DOJ) has not explicitly named FTX because the affected crypto trade, two insiders reportedly confirmed that it corresponds to the “victim company 1” talked about within the indictment.

Meanwhile, for perpetrating this assault, Powell, Hernandez, and Rohn have been charged with fraud and id theft.

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