The largest Bitcoin theft from an individual was allegedly carried out by a Canadian teenager.
A youth was apprehended recently on suspicion of stealing crypto-currency worth around $36.5m from an unnamed victim who resides in the United States.
According to the allegation, the defendant gained access to the victim’s cell phone through a SIM swapping attack and used the access to move the funds contained in the digital wallet of the victim.
In March 2020, Hamilton Police commenced a joint investigation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the United States Secret Service Electronic Crimes Task Force.
A recent statement released by Hamilton Police read: “The victim had been targeted by a SIM swap attack, a method of hijacking valuable accounts by manipulating cellular network employees to duplicate phone numbers so threat actors can intercept two-factor authorization requests.
“As a result of the SIM swap attack, approximately CAD 46 million worth of cryptocurrency was stolen from the victim.”
“This is currently the biggest cryptocurrency theft reported from one person.”
Investigators connected the defendant to the criminal act after the teenager allegedly used some of their criminal proceeds to purchase an item online.
“The joint investigation revealed that some of the stolen cryptocurrency was used to purchase an online username that was considered to be rare in the gaming community,” stated Hamilton Police.
“This transaction led investigators to uncover the account holder of the rare username.”
Police did not disclose the age of the alleged thief, nor the item allegedly purchased with the stolen crypto-currency.
The teenager was recently arrested for the theft of over $5,000 and possession of property or proceeds of property obtained by crime. Hamilton Police have so far seized crypto-currency valued at over CAD 7m.
The matter is now in court. Hamilton Police are requesting anyone with valuable information about this crime to contact Hamilton Police Service Detective Constable Kenneth Kirkpatrick or call the charity CrimeStoppers of Hamilton.
During an interview with CBC, Kirkpatrick said: “The amount, of course, is very surprising.
“That’s a large amount of money, and it’s a large amount of money in anybody’s opinion.”
