U.S. Department of Justice

A man in the United States was sentenced to 14 months in prison for hacking into SEC X accounts to manipulate Bitcoin prices

According to ChainCatcher news, a 26-year-old Alabama resident, Eric Council Jr., was sentenced to 14 months in prison for participating in the hacking of the official Twitter account of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and posting false news about the approval of a Bitcoin ETF. He gained control of the SEC account through a SIM swap attack, causing significant fluctuations in Bitcoin prices.According to court documents, Council obtained a SIM card associated with the SEC's phone number at an AT&T store in Alabama on January 9, 2024, using forged identification. He then purchased a new phone to receive the SEC X account password reset. His accomplices used that access to post false news about the approval of a Bitcoin ETF, resulting in a surge of over $1,000 in Bitcoin prices within a short period, followed by a drop of more than $2,000 after the SEC clarified the situation.In addition to imprisonment, the court also ordered the forfeiture of his illegal gains of $50,000 and imposed three years of supervised release, during which he is prohibited from using the dark web and committing identity fraud. Investigations revealed that Council was also involved in multiple SIM swap attacks, profiting approximately $50,000 from them.This case was jointly investigated by the FBI's Washington office and the SEC's Office of Inspector General, highlighting the regulatory agencies' efforts to combat the manipulation of financial markets through cybercrime. The head of the Department of Justice's Criminal Division emphasized the commitment to holding accountable those who threaten the integrity of the digital asset market.

The U.S. Department of Justice has shut down the cryptocurrency exchange Garantex, and two administrators have been charged with money laundering

ChainCatcher news reports that according to an announcement from the U.S. Department of Justice, the United States, along with Germany and Finland, has successfully dismantled and seized the online infrastructure of the cryptocurrency exchange Garantex. Since April 2019, the exchange has processed at least $96 billion in cryptocurrency transactions and has been accused of providing money laundering services to transnational criminal organizations, including terrorist groups, and violating sanctions.At the same time, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia has filed a lawsuit against two administrators of Garantex: 46-year-old Lithuanian national Aleksej Besciokov and 40-year-old Russian national residing in the UAE, Aleksandr Mira Serda. Both are charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering, and Besciokov is additionally charged with conspiracy to violate sanctions and operating an unlicensed money transmission business.Court documents show that from 2019 to 2025, the two defendants controlled and operated Garantex, knowingly allowing the platform to be used for money laundering while taking steps to conceal the illegal activities. Despite the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioning Garantex on April 5, 2022, the defendants continued to transact with U.S. entities and redesigned their operations to evade sanctions, including changing cryptocurrency wallet addresses daily to avoid detection and blocking by U.S. cryptocurrency exchanges.U.S. law enforcement has seized three domain names: Garantex.org, Garantex.io, and Garantex.academy, frozen over $26 million in funds used for money laundering, and obtained server copies that include customer and accounting databases. If convicted, the two defendants face a maximum of 20 years in prison.
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