Florida teenager Graham Ivan Clark, who was the alleged mastermind behind the July 2020 Bitcoin-related Twitter hack that affected Apple and numerous other well-known accounts, has agreed to a plea deal that will see him spending three years in prison.
The Tampa Bay Times:
The Tampa teen who took control of well-known Twitter accounts last summer and used them to solicit more than $100,000 in Bitcoin pleaded guilty to state charges Tuesday in exchange for a three-year prison sentence.
In a deal with prosecutors, Graham Ivan Clark agreed to serve three years in prison, followed by three years probation.
Clark conspired with other bad actors to compromise the Twitter accounts of 130 well-known companies and individuals to solicit Bitcoin, scamming people out of more than $100,000. Apple’s official account was compromised, as were the accounts of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, former U.S. President Barack Obama, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, and President Joe Biden.
Because Clark was only 17-years-old at the time of the attack, he will be sentenced as a “youthful offender” and could be eligible to serve some of his time in a military-style boot camp.
The terms of the plea deal will prevent Clark from using computers without permission and supervision from law enforcement.
Hackers targeted employees in a “phone spear-phishing attack,” tricking them into thinking they were speaking to other Twitter employees to gain access to Twitter’s internal tools.
Mason “Chaewon” Sheppard from the UK, as well as Nima “Rolex” Fazeli, have also been charged in the attack and are facing prison time.