U.S. prosecutors charge five members of "Scattered Spider" with stealing at least $11 million in cryptocurrency through hacking

According to an indictment released on Wednesday, U.S. prosecutors have charged five members of the "Scattered Spider" gang with launching hacking attacks on dozens of companies and individuals, resulting in the theft of sensitive data and at least $11 million in cryptocurrency. Federal prosecutors in California said the defendants used a variety of fraudulent methods, including SMS phishing and SIM card swapping, to obtain legitimate credentials from employees to gain unauthorized access to their accounts and corporate networks between late 2021 and spring 2023. U.S. authorities said the defendants used this access to steal confidential data and identify and access individuals' cryptocurrency accounts and wallets. Prosecutors said about $4 million of the stolen cryptocurrency has been recovered, and investigators are still calculating the total value of the data theft. It is understood that Scattered Spider is a decentralized organization that often uses social engineering techniques to trick IT employees into accessing corporate networks, and some of its members are located in the United States and the United Kingdom. (Bloomberg)