Three were charged by the US Justice Department for attempting a SIM-swap theft of $400 million from FTX, per last week’s court indictment.
The indictment filed with the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois states that from March 2021 to April 2023, three people—Carter Rohn, Emily Hernandez, and Robert Powell—performed SIM-swapping frauds that targeted several victims.
Cracking Down on the FTX SIM-Swap Heist
The indictment explained that “a SIM swap attack refers to the process of fraudulently inducing a carrier to reassign a cell phone number from the legitimate subscriber or user’s SIM card to a SIM card controlled by a criminal actor.”
Grand Jury Indicts Hackers Linked to $400 Million Stolen from FTX
According to prosecutors, Americans Robert Powell, Carter Rohn, and Emily Hernandez carried out SIM swap attacks between March 2021 and April 2023. https://t.co/QrW42a6pFk pic.twitter.com/VJazagN3lB
— D2 Trade Coin (@D2TraderCoin) February 2, 2024
Interestingly, the filing did not name FTX as the targeted exchange. However, Bloomberg, citing two people with knowledge of the case, revealed that FTX is one of the victims of the attacks. The sources claim FTX was identified in the filing as Victim Company-1.
The report also detailed an attack on Victim Company 1. It claimed Hernandez posed as an employee of the business on November 11 and 12, 2022, after which Powell obtained access to their AT&T account, opened company accounts, and moved over $400 million in digital assets from the wallets.
Hackers Charged with Identity Theft
Interestingly, a new report from blockchain security firm Elliptic confirms “that FTX is the ‘Victim Company-1’ named in the indictment.” Elliptic notes that there were several unauthorized transactions totaling $400 million on FTX’s crypto wallets shortly after it filed for bankruptcy on Nov. 11, 2022.
The report notes that shortly after the hack, the hackers transferred some of the money to the crypto exchange Kraken. The hackers continued to move the stolen funds across different bridges and blockchains as part of their attempt to launder the money.
#FTX’s $400M hack linked to SIM swap attack, feds charge 3 :
Three individuals charged by United States prosecutors for orchestrating a series of sim-swap attacks have been linked to the $400 million hack of FTX in 2022 that occurred just hours after it filed for bankruptcy.
— TOBTC (@_TOBTC) February 2, 2024
The DOJ reportedly charged the three fraudsters with identity theft and wire fraud conspiracy. These charges finally resolve one of the most frustrating unanswered mysteries in the FTX story. Many had wondered about the whereabouts of the millions of dollars of cryptocurrency that vanished after the exchange filed for bankruptcy.
However, most crypto users have called for better security measures to protect users’ assets. Attackers have recently turned to sim-swapping as one of their latest techniques. Some high-profile crypto users fell victim to this tactic in 2023, most recently the US SEC.
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