According to TechFlow, on October 18, the FBI arrested 25-year-old Eric Council Jr. in Athens, Alabama. He was accused of participating in the hacking of the X account (formerly Twitter) of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in January this year. The incident caused the price of Bitcoin to surge by $1,000 in a short period of time.
According to the indictment, Council conspired with others to illegally control the SEC's official X account on January 9, 2024, and impersonated the SEC chairman to release false news, claiming that the SEC approved the listing of the Bitcoin ETF. After the news was released, the price of Bitcoin quickly rose by more than $1,000. The SEC later clarified that the news was caused by an unauthorized security vulnerability, and the price of Bitcoin immediately fell by more than $2,000.
The investigation revealed that the hackers gained access to the SEC X account through a "SIM swap" technique. Council is accused of using a fake ID to obtain a victim's SIM card from a cell phone provider in Huntsville and purchase a new iPhone. He then shared the access code to the SEC X account with a co-conspirator, leading to the release of the false message.
According to previous news, on January 10 this year, the official account of the SEC announced the approval of the listing of the spot Bitcoin ETF on the X platform, and then released a message saying, "The SEC's X account has been stolen and unauthorized posts have been posted. The SEC has not yet approved the listing and trading of the spot Bitcoin ETF product."
