20-year-old College student who used a method of substitution of the SIM card (SIM swapping) to steal more than $5 million in the cryptocurrency, pleaded guilty and sentenced in California to a ten-year prison term. This writes the Motherboard.
In total victims of Joel Ortiz were about 40 people, believed to be the law enforcement officials, this is the first case in the United States, when a person receives a prison term for SIM swapping is gaining popularity among hackers method of gaining access to a victim’s phone.
Also, the authorities say it will be a good lesson to others who commit similar crimes and have been arrested or are wanted.
“Every arrest was a shock to their community. It was a signal that they can’t feel safe – either in my basement or at home moms. They are looking for and arrested, one after another,” said Erin West, Deputy district attorney at County of Santa Clara.
Joel Ortiz was arrested in July of 2018 after together with a group of accomplices began a series of hacker attacks on members of the cryptocurrency community. Being able to establish control over the numbers of victims, they received including access to two-factor authentication that protected the wallets and accounts at the exchanges, and then stole bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies. It is reported that some of the victims were guests of the Consensus conference in new York.
Prison term Joel Ortiz will begin to serve on March 14.
Recall that in September last year, police Oklahoma city was arrested two hackers suspected of using SIM swapping to hack cryptocurrency platform Crowd Machine and steal your tokens for a total amount of $14 million
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