tl;dr
Eric Council Jr., a 25-year-old Alabama man, has pleaded guilty to hacking the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) X account, resulting in a fake announcement about the approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETF). This led to a significant increase and subsequent drop in the pri...
Eric Council Jr., a 25-year-old Alabama man, has pleaded guilty to hacking the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) X account, resulting in a fake announcement about the approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETF). This led to a significant increase and subsequent drop in the price of Bitcoin. The hack was allegedly carried out through an unauthorized SIM swap, and Council was paid in Bitcoin to use a stolen identity to make the fraudulent post. He has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft and access device fraud and faces up to five years in prison.
In January 2024, Eric Council Jr., 25, conspired with others to commandeer the SEC’s X account and prematurely announce the approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETF) in the US, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ). The fake ETF announcement caused the price of Bitcoin to increase by more than $1,000 and then drop by more than $2,000 after the SEC regained control of its X account and declared the statement to be unauthorized and the result of a security breach. The regulator legitimately greenlit spot Bitcoin ETFs soon after the security incident.
The DOJ alleges Council carried out the hack through an unauthorized SIM swap, which involves fraudulently persuading a cellphone carrier to reassign another person’s contact number to a SIM card controlled by a bad actor. Council was paid in Bitcoin to use the stolen identity of a person who had access to the SEC’s X account, and then the DOJ alleges that his co-conspirators made the fraudulent post.
The Alabama man pled guilty to conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft and access device fraud and is scheduled to be sentenced in May. He faces up to five years in prison.