The US Department Of Justice Wants To Confiscate Bitcoin Worth IDR 79.8 Billion From This Teenager Hacker

US legal authorities want to confiscate Bitcoin from this teenage hacker. (Photo; Doc. Bitcoin Exchange Guide)

JAKARTA - The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) is trying to take over millions of dollars in Bitcoin which was stolen by a teenage hacker from executives in the crypto world four years ago. In addition, prosecutors are also committed to returning the sports car the hacker had purchased with the stolen Bitcoin.

Last week, a federal judge issued an order requiring Ahmad Wagafe Hared to return a total of 5.2 million US dollars (Rp79.8 billion) in the form of Bitcoin he had stolen in 2016.

Based on reports from The San Francisco Standard, Bitcoin and cars purchased by Hared were the result of illegal acts known as SIM exchange schemes that took place between 2016 and 2018.

SIM-swapping is a tactic in which a hacker trickes a mobile phone service provider to give control of the target phone by posing as its legal owner. This is a tactic commonly used by hackers in an attempt to gain access to personal data to be later stolen from their targets, or to avoid second-factor authentication measures that use text messages.

In 2016, Harred, who was only 18 years old at the time and lives in feasibility, Arizona, collaborated with a colleague, Matthew Gene Ditman of Nevada, to manipulate customer service representatives of mobile phone providers to disclose information about SIM cards related to accounts of crypto executives in northern California.

Although the identities of the executives were not mentioned, the region is known as home to Silicon Valley and the community of leading crypto companies. Coinbase, the largest exchange in the United States, was based in San Francisco before moving to a more remote location.

Harred is already known as a darknet user with the username 'winblo', which creates "active" and "adcognized" reputations in the online market where high-price social media accounts are sold to certain buyers.

With some of the stolen money, Harred bought a BMW i8 worth about 150,000 US dollars (Rp2.3 billion) at the time, according to a report from Brian Krebs, an independent cybersecurity journalist. Prosecutors stated that the two even called some of their victims after taking over their accounts with the aim of exploiting them further.

This scheme was finally uncovered in 2019 after the FBI managed to identify Harred and Ditman and arrested both of them. Until now, both of them have not undergone a court process.