Twitter Hack: Three arrests for Bitcoin Scam

Compact:

On July 15th, a spectacular hack succeeded, affecting the Twitter accounts of over 100 celebrities.
The attackers used the control over the accounts to commit advance fraud with Bitcoin.
Now three young men have been arrested.  One of them is still a minor.
The accounts of Joe Biden, Barack Obama and Elon Musk were just some of the accounts that were taken over by the attackers in mid-July. They used control of the accounts to ask other users on the social media platform to transfer Bitcoin to them. In doing so, they promised to send back double the amount to the victims.

Many experienced users quickly noticed this widely known variation of the advance fraud. What was new, however, was that the celebrities were not fake accounts, but were actually affected.

Thus, the perpetrators managed to convince a whole range of people to transfer large amounts of Bitcoin to them anyway. Now there were three arrests yesterday in the USA and Great Britain. A group of three young men are believed to be behind them.

Perpetrators named themselves: Rolex and Chaewon
In the official announcement of the US Department of Justice, three young men are accused of having committed several crimes in connection with the hack. One of the suspects is a 19-year-old British man who nicknamed himself Chaewon. He is accused of computer fraud and money laundering.

A 22-year-old man from Florida is accused of gaining access to protected computer systems or at least being an accessory to them. He was operating under the pseudonym "Rolex".

The third suspect is a minor, for whom no details have been published officially due to his age.

According to several media reports, however, the suspect is a 17-year-old youth, who is also from Florida. The three of them are said to have jointly stolen Bitcoin to a total value of 100,000 US dollars.

Big load: Block chain analysis in action
The three suspected perpetrators actually became public enemy number one, and in addition to the FBI, the IRS Cybercrime Unit also participated in the investigation. In addition, several public prosecutor's offices are involved in the case.

In addition, British law enforcement agencies also took part in the investigation. Chainalysis was also commended in the case. This leads to the conclusion that the perpetrators could also be identified on the basis of the transaction in the Bitcoin network.

However, they are said to have gained actual access to the accounts by pretending to be on the staff of the social media giant. This procedure, known as "social engineering", cannot always be exposed in time. This is often the case when the perpetrators have profound knowledge of IT and the respective business processes.

TP