Co-responsible of major Twitter hack in 2020 gets five years in prison

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A 24-year-old Briton has been sentenced to five years in prison for his role in several hacks, including the massive Twitter hack of 2020, which took over the accounts of prominent users to spread crypto scams.

The 24-year-old man, known online as PlugwalkJoe, has been found guilty to ten crimes, including computer hacking, wire fraud and cyberstalking. The charges carried a maximum prison sentence of 77 years. Prosecutors from the US Department of Justice wanted the Brit to be sentenced to at least seven years.

PlugwalkJoe was arrested in 2021 and has been in pre-trial detention since then. He therefore now has to serve approximately half of his five-year sentence. In addition to prison time, the man must hand over $794,000 that was stolen in a SIM swap case that is separate from the Twitter hack. He must also pay compensation to victims.

The big Twitter hack happened in July 2020. PlugwalkJoe, together with several accomplices, managed to gain access to Twitter’s internal systems. The accounts of more than 130 well-known users were taken over, including those of Apple, Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Elon Musk and Joe Biden. The taken over accounts were then used to spread crypto scams, with which 104,000 euros worth of bitcoins were stolen at the time. Last month, PlugwalkJoe pleaded guilty to this hack and other cyber crimes.

Several people have already been arrested in connection with the Twitter hack, including a Florida man who allegedly orchestrated the attack and later pleaded guilty to 30 charges. He was 17 years old at the time of the attack and became sentenced to three years in prison in 2021.

A crypto scam tweet that the hackers sent on behalf of Jeff Bezos

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