SAN JOSÉ, California. – When in the spring of 2018 Joel Ortiz got into the point of revision at the International Airport of Los Angeles was crucified by his cabbage that nine months ago he was converted into one of the first persons in the United States and was sentenced by the SIM’s exchange ‘, a means of fraud which consists in obtaining access to the data of the SIM card of the cellular telephone of the victim.
This is the method that this 21-year-old IT pirate used to rob more than $ 7.5 million over the last 40 weeks in all of the country, including varying the Silicon Valley region. This day, at the Los Angeles Air Terminal, a young student studying the detectives of the cyber police of the Santa Clara County, California, as part of the REACT (Regional Enforcement Allied Computer Team) group, charged with combating electronic crimes in the capital of technology.
During several months, REACT agents followed the track to Ortiz, which agreed with the tax authorities, carrying out a live show that included dressing and accessory accessories, traveling by helicopter to music festivals, paying $ 10,000 in Los Angeles clubs and hosts up to $ 59,000 in rentals in this city run by Airbnb.
No son Robin Hoods. These are the ones who used a computer to make a gun. There is no such thing as an experimental monetary type of ether, meaning that there is a wealth of university funds, mortgage payments, the financial life of its victims, ”said Erin West, who was sentenced to life imprisonment by Ortiz. passed by a judge of the Superior Court of the District of Santa Clara 10 years in prison for robbery of identity and one more decade of cybercrime.
Between the decades of Ortiz’s offenses, two cases involving several months of difference in the Bahá’í Areas have led to the collapse of the road for the authorities to finally tear down the roads. A week ago in May 2018, when minutes were spent the engineer to rob $ 5.2 million in cryptocurrencies from a Cupertino empress. But there was a much smaller bout of Bitcoin coins that finally opened the Pandora’s box that led to cybernetic policies being pursued by the ‘hacker’ who was hacking.
Also in 2018, a resident of the Santa Clara county contacted REACT’s office to announce a case of identity theft. The most important news came during the month of February, the AT&T cellular phone company called it to announce that a person had passed by had it entered into a transaction to transfer data from its account to a new SIM card. One more thing, however, the victim notices that varying amounts of social media have compromised time and around $ 10,000 in Bitcoins have been deducted from their accounts.
Thank you in this case the authorities have discovered that an electronic mail account from Ortiz is used from one of the telephones to the ones that will transfer the new SIM card. Among these data, including a photograph showing the accused’s identification of the state of Massachusetts, which he gave to agents with additional accounts of cryptocurrencies obtained in Ortiz that revealed transfers of $ 1.5 million.
How does ‘SIM swapping’ work?
For Santa Clara’s condona fiscalía, Joel Ortiz has turned into an ‘SIM swapping’ artist who has been trying to get rid of those who easily rob cryptocurrencies and support their social networks to easily sell Bitcoins.
Its ‘operating mode’ consists mainly of two steps: first access to private data that it allows to meet the telephone companies that it was one of its customers to transfer (many times in person) are to a new SIM card, which ultimately works to gain access to personal, social and financial information from its victims.
In the most common form of this fraud, the ‘hackers’ call the telecommunications companies haciéndose pass by their victims ensuring that he loses his SIM cards and that the gustaria that his cellular number is transferred to a new ‘chip’, as también se les conoce a las tarjetas SIM. To violate the security measures of the companies, the staffs are valen of numbers of social security robots, as well as directories and other dates that many people often revise the social reasons of their victims.
Once the company is transferring the cellular number to the new card, IT pirates will receive access to all the information that the victim links on his phone, including personal bank accounts and electronic mail services.
The authorities advise that it is common for the ‘hackers’ to use the technique of sending ‘phishing’ through e-mails or cadena publications on Facebook. Many times, the personal information that is obtained with these methods is sufficient to respond to the security issues that users use to protect their financial and social applications.
Graduated with honor
Santa Clara’s public defender, Dennis Dawson, rated his client’s sentence as “ridiculously high”. The adjective that employees are not disqualified if they are aware that the Department of Conditional Liberty has recommended to initiate a penitentiary only one year in prison.
In agreement with the Fiscalia, Joel Ortiz graduated with honors from a Boston preparatory school and is currently studying at the University of Massachusetts with a full degree. For his defense, the ‘hacker’ could be a criminal with malice, be more vigilant of the crimes and his own ignorance, a young man diagnosed with autism, deficiencies in development and without friends, salute those who know internet and that eventually the orillaron to involve in the staff.
“It’s the hardest job and the one that makes it easier,” said Dawson. The lawyer agrees that his client owns a family of many resources and lives with his mother in a living room of Section 8 while studying at the community college.
During the prevailing hearings, the taxpayers will present as evidence whether they have a number of images published on social media that show the role and the life of excesses and excesses that Ortiz lives at the expense of the money. His lawyer indicated that, while dealing with a violet crime, all of his guests should not have been affected.
“So it’s what chicks do. Ponen todo and Instagram, says verse ‘cool’. “When you’re nerdy with nerd problems like Joel, ‘cool’ green is probably one of his metas,” Dawson said.
At the time of his arrest, the investigating officer will cover $ 400,000 in Poder de Ortiz. The rest, following the Fiscalía, the mantiene escondido o ya fue gastado.
Do you think that a ‘hacker’ can rob you of the information you access and your intelligence?
