According to CryptoPotato, Sam Curry, a security engineer at Yuga Labs, was recently at the center of a federal investigation conducted jointly by the Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation Division (IRS-CI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The investigation traces back to Curry’s involvement in uncovering a cryptocurrency phishing website in December 2022.

Curry shared the incident on his social media account, detailing the events that led to his subpoena and subsequent investigation by federal authorities. Upon returning to the United States after his trip to Japan, Curry was directed to a secondary inspection room, where he was handed a Grand Jury subpoena. For nearly an hour, Curry was grilled by officers from the IRS-CI and DHS who presented him with vague questions about a “high profile phishing campaign” and how his IP address could have been connected to a threat actor.

In December 2022, Curry played an important role in uncovering a crypto phishing website that had stolen millions of dollars. The scammer accidentally published their Ethereum private key in the website’s JavaScript. Curry had attempted to investigate the incident by importing the private key into his MetaMask and checking if any assets were left in the wallet. During this process, he used his home IP address. The investigating agents requested the account’s authorization logs from OpenSea and traced the IP back to Curry. As a result, they issued a subpoena, leading to his unexpected encounter with federal authorities. However, after communicating with Curry’s lawyer and the authorities, the subpoena was dismissed, and all data from Curry’s device was deleted.