A teenager from Florida has been arrested as he is believed to be responsible for one of Twitter's biggest security breaches in its history.
A couple of weeks ago, several major Twitter accounts were hacked, hitting nearly anyone with blue checkmarks. Even the accounts held by Bill Gates, Uber, and former President Bartack Obama weren't safe from the biggest attack in Twitter history, which was believed to be controlled by Bitcoin scammers. As to why the hijacking was launched and geared towards major political influencers and celebrities by tweeting out a Bitcoin scam still remains a mystery.
A major investigation was promptly launched by the FBI, and Twitter took extensive measures to halt the hackers from gaining access such as by temporarily revoking the ability to post from Twitter users with blue checks until the attack ceased. Twitter later revealed how the scammers had gained access to its internal network and account management, leading some to believe that it was an inside job. However, early this morning, a 17-year-old from Tampa, Florida, was placed under arrest by the FBI, IRS, US Secret Service, and Florida law enforcement.
The teen is believed to be the mastermind behind the massive Twitter attack on July 15th. He's currently in jail with over 30 felony charges over his head, including 17 charges of organized fraud, one count of hacking, and 10 counts of identity theft. The Hillsborough State Attorney's Office in charge of the investigation state that his scheme was to steal the identities of influential people, then tweet out a Bitcoin address to send money to Bitcoin accounts he owns. By doing this, he was able to collect over $100,000 in less than a day of the hacking scheme taking place.
The scam allegedly orchestrated by the teen tricked people into sending him money with the promise that he would send back double. From a prominent account he had hacked into, he tweeted out: "I am giving back to the community. All Bitcoin sent to the address below will be sent back doubled!" He also claimed to be "only doing this for 30 minutes," which prompted many Twitter users to buy into the scam.
"He's a 17-year-old kid who apparently just graduated high school," says State Attorney Andrew Warren in a press conference. "But make no mistake, this was not an ordinary 17-year-old. This was a highly sophisticated attack on a magnitude never seen before." The teen will be tried as an adult, the prosecutor states because Florida law allows them the flexibility to do this when dealing with financial fraud cases.