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Highlights
- Boy, 17, recognized for “masterminding” the hacking: Police
- Teen was arrested from Tampa, Hillsborough
- Cyber assault had enabled hackers to take management of prime Twitter profiles
Miami:
Criminal expenses have been filed on Friday towards the suspected teenage mastermind of an epic Twitter hack and two others who allegedly helped hijack movie star accounts to swindle folks out of greater than $100,000 in a cryptocurrency scheme.
Prosecutors in Florida mentioned they filed 30 felony counts towards 17-year-old resident of the state recognized because the “mastermind” of the cyberattack. He was arrested in Tampa, Hillsborough State Attorney Andrew Warren mentioned.
Separately, the US Attorney’s Office in San Francisco introduced expenses towards three folks, one among them from Britain, for roles within the mid-July cyberattack that rocked Twitter.
US officers mentioned 19-year-old Mason “Chaewon” Sheppard of Britain together with Nima Fazeli, 22, of Florida face felony expenses within the case.
Details concerning the third particular person weren’t launched by US officers as a result of he’s a minor, but it surely appeared they have been referring to the Florida teenager being prosecuted as grownup in that state.
The assault on Twitter concerned a mix of “technical breaches and social engineering” that permit hackers hijack accounts of politicians, celebrities, and musicians, in accordance with federal prosecutors.
Follow the cash
The three defendants are accused of hacking Twitter accounts, making a rip-off Bitcoin account, and sending out imposter tweets from hijacked account providing to double Bitcoin cryptocurrency deposits.
“This case serves as a great example of how following the money, international collaboration, and public-private partnerships can work to successfully take down a perceived anonymous criminal enterprise,” mentioned felony investigation particular agent Kelly Jackson of the Internal Revenue Service.
The assault which Twitter mentioned resulted from a “phone spear phishing” assault enabled hackers to take management of accounts of well-known folks akin to Bill Gates, Elon Musk and former US president Barack Obama and dupe folks into sending Bitcoin.
“These crimes were perpetrated using the names of famous people and celebrities, but they’re not the primary victims here,” Warren mentioned in a launch.
“This ‘Bit-Con’ was designed to steal money from regular Americans from all over the country.”
Scamming by cellphone
Hackers who accessed dozens of high-profile Twitter accounts in mid-July gained entry to the system with an assault that tricked a handful of staff into giving up their credentials, in accordance with an organization replace.
Twitter mentioned this week that the July 15 incident by Bitcoin scammers stemmed from a “spear phishing” assault which deceived staff concerning the origin of the messages.
The hackers “targeted a small number of employees through a phone spear phishing attack,” in accordance with a Twitter Support assertion.
“This attack relied on a significant and concerted attempt to mislead certain employees and exploit human vulnerabilities to gain access to our internal systems.”
Twitter mentioned that following the incident it has “significantly limited access to our internal tools and systems” and is taking extra steps to tighten safety.
The large hack of high-profile customers from Elon Musk to Joe Biden affected at the very least 130 accounts, with tweets posted by the usurpers duping folks into sending Bitcoin to accounts that Warren mentioned have been related to Clark.
The official accounts of Apple, Uber, Kanye West, Bill Gates, Barack Obama and others have been additionally affected.
Faked tweets have been despatched from 45 accounts, in accordance with Twitter, and the hackers accessed non-public messages of 36 and downloaded Twitter knowledge from seven.
The incident has raised issues concerning the safety of the platform more and more used for conversations on politics and public affairs.
John Dickson of the safety agency Denim Group mentioned the most recent disclosure didn’t essentially recommend a classy assault from a nation-state and famous it could have been doable to search out targets by means of analysis on LinkedIn or Google.
“This is like the original hackers from the 1980s and 1990s; they were very good at conning people and getting them to give their credentials,” Dickson mentioned.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is printed from a syndicated feed.)
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