An investor lost $24 million worth of bitcoin

[Johnii]

 

A Crypto investor Michael Terpin lost roughly 1,5oo bitcoins on January 7, 2018, after falling victim to a SIM swap attack, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The bitcoin stake was worth $24 million that day, roughly three weeks after the asset hit its record high price.
The incredibly precise hack involves thieves taking control of a phone number and using it to access email accounts, bank reserves, and even crypto wallets.
Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
One crypto investor lost bitcoin worth as much as $24 million after falling victim to a new kind of hack known as SIM swapping, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Michael Terpin was hit by the attack on January 7, 2018, days after bitcoin reached its record high price. Thieves stole roughly 1,500 bitcoins by taking control of his phone number and using Google's "Forgot password?" feature to gain access to his email. With possession of the two personal accounts, the thieves hacked Terpin's crypto wallet, stole the digital assets and quickly sold them, according to WSJ.
Bitcoin traded between $16,969 and $15,790 per coin on January 7, 2018. The digital coin now trades at roughly $8,700.

Source:
Wall Street journal

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[DeathAngel]

This sucks, I see stories like this all the time on here. He really shouldn’t have been keeping that amount of crypto online though. It should be on paper wallets or a hardware wallet. Sad for him

[Johnii]

This sucks, I see stories like this all the time on here. He really shouldn’t have been keeping that amount of crypto online though. It should be on paper wallets or a hardware wallet. Sad for him

Yes of course leaving such a huge amount of Bitcoin on the net is totally insane. I hope he and any other whale investors pay attention, because scammers will come back again when bullmarket start to find new victims

[Quidat]

This sucks, I see stories like this all the time on here. He really shouldn’t have been keeping that amount of crypto online though. It should be on paper wallets or a hardware wallet. Sad for him

Yes of course leaving such a huge amount of Bitcoin on the net is totally insane. I hope he and any other whale investors pay attention, because scammers will come back again when bullmarket start to find new victims

They dont only attack on a bullmarket but even to this time yet these hackers do knows bitcoins value potential on upcoming years.
We've seen exchange hacks as of this years which proves out that these criminals are just finding the right timing to stole precious bitcoin.
Keeping coins on a web-wallet isnt really ideal as i have read it do involves access of email which means he might stored up some keys or simply
able to access his exchange accounts?

[enhu]

With such amount it shouldn't be on the exchange or online wallet where anyone with the knowledge of howtos can access anyone's email. Some websites can even be accessed by the mobile's phone number, they don't need to know your email address but just the mobile number. If $1M is worth the killing, for $24M I'd probably bomb the suspect to pieces.

[trumpman]

A Crypto investor Michael Terpin lost roughly 1,5oo bitcoins on January 7, 2018, after falling victim to a SIM swap attack, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The bitcoin stake was worth $24 million that day, roughly three weeks after the asset hit its record high price.
The incredibly precise hack involves thieves taking control of a phone number and using it to access email accounts, bank reserves, and even crypto wallets.
Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
One crypto investor lost bitcoin worth as much as $24 million after falling victim to a new kind of hack known as SIM swapping, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Michael Terpin was hit by the attack on January 7, 2018, days after bitcoin reached its record high price. Thieves stole roughly 1,500 bitcoins by taking control of his phone number and using Google's "Forgot password?" feature to gain access to his email. With possession of the two personal accounts, the thieves hacked Terpin's crypto wallet, stole the digital assets and quickly sold them, according to WSJ.
Bitcoin traded between $16,969 and $15,790 per coin on January 7, 2018. The digital coin now trades at roughly $8,700.

Source:
Wall Street journal

Lol, poor bastard

I guess it s partially his fault for storing his bitcoins online instead of using a safe wallet. Hopefully, his story will become a lesson for some doing the same mistake

[Artemis3]

A Crypto investor Michael Terpin lost roughly 1,5oo bitcoins on January 7, 2018, after falling victim to a SIM swap attack, The Wall Street Journal reported.

January 2018? Talk about ancient...

SIM attacks are nothing new, it is but another attack vector. People should act smarter, but its quite the opposite. One tells them to stop using windows our put wallets in smartphones, and yet they keep doing it, until they get hit and blame it on Bitcoin, when in reality it was their attitude that prompted it.

Google dependency also didn't help, maybe if he just used another email provider...

[ChrisPop]

And.. this is why you should keep your holdings in a hardware or paper wallet. Or even a software wallet if the wallet is not connected to the internet. By SIM swapping it means that someone changed the sim card in his phone? Then it is the investor's fault as well especially if he knew he has such a big stake in cryptocurrency. In the era of technology, extra cybersecurity measures are a must and we should all at least get a basic education on how to protect ourselves against cyber threats.

[Silberman]

A Crypto investor Michael Terpin lost roughly 1,5oo bitcoins on January 7, 2018, after falling victim to a SIM swap attack, The Wall Street Journal reported.

January 2018? Talk about ancient...

SIM attacks are nothing new, it is but another attack vector. People should act smarter, but its quite the opposite. One tells them to stop using windows our put wallets in smartphones, and yet they keep doing it, until they get hit and blame it on Bitcoin, when in reality it was their attitude that prompted it.

Google dependency also didn't help, maybe if he just used another email provider...

Bitcoin and its characteristic that allows each single user to become their own bank switches the responsibility of protecting their coins to each one of us and it is important to not take that responsibility lightly, it is very important that we do everything that we can to protect our coins even if the amount of money is small to us, since there are many people out there that would like to get possession of our coins, it is incredible that all of this could have been prevented by just buying a hardware wallet and store his holdings there.

[bitmover]

The idea of holding 24 million dollars in an online wallet is so crazy.

Easy come, easy goes...
Old news, but nice share.

[Theb]

This is somehow old news woth regards to Michael Terpin. He recently filed a lawsuit against AT&T for breach of contract and he will try to win his $24 million from them, not to mention he also have 50 other individuals who have been victimized by sim swapping because of the process AT&T gives for people trying to access someone else's sim card. I personally think Terpin would win specially of has 50 other individuals who are the sam victims as him.

[Ailmand]

Have came accross this news before. Such a huge amount of cryptocurrency should not be kept online. This is worth sharing to spread awareness for those who are keeping their crypto online. It is never advisable to leave your money online. Secure your funds, keep it in a hardware wallet.

[sureshnsnet]

Really it is a sad story it going to be lessons for all who have weak hands in secure measures. So we have to store our coins in most secure wallet as may people are trusted that with our secure identity. But nowadays the hackers be come too smart and they can find new tricks and ideas to hack people's information so we can not share our information any free paying online website or scam surveys.

[BChydro]

This sucks, I see stories like this all the time on here. He really shouldn’t have been keeping that amount of crypto online though. It should be on paper wallets or a hardware wallet. Sad for him

We see all these stories all the time and still people are not learning is the biggest problem, storing your coins in your mobile or online wallet is the dumbest thing you can do and if he is holding that much coins what stops him from storing it safely, hardware wallet is not that expensive and there is no point in investing millions if you do not know how to keep the coins safe.

[boltz]

Wow! That is a big hack attack and the target was well known otherwise they wouldn't know that he had 1.5k$ BTC which is crazy and foolish in the same time to not have extra security for such a big amount.

Imagine holding 24mil$ in a simple wallet thinking that you're not a target for those hackers who are waiting for people just like him in order to make their moves. I hope this is a lesson for those who are having big amounts of Bitcoin and not only , to improve the security of their wallets or simply move towards cold and hardware wallets.

[agentx44]

A Crypto investor Michael Terpin lost roughly 1,5oo bitcoins on January 7, 2018, after falling victim to a SIM swap attack, The Wall Street Journal reported.
The bitcoin stake was worth $24 million that day, roughly three weeks after the asset hit its record high price.
The incredibly precise hack involves thieves taking control of a phone number and using it to access email accounts, bank reserves, and even crypto wallets.
Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
One crypto investor lost bitcoin worth as much as $24 million after falling victim to a new kind of hack known as SIM swapping, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Michael Terpin was hit by the attack on January 7, 2018, days after bitcoin reached its record high price. Thieves stole roughly 1,500 bitcoins by taking control of his phone number and using Google's "Forgot password?" feature to gain access to his email. With possession of the two personal accounts, the thieves hacked Terpin's crypto wallet, stole the digital assets and quickly sold them, according to WSJ.
Bitcoin traded between $16,969 and $15,790 per coin on January 7, 2018. The digital coin now trades at roughly $8,700.

Source:
Wall Street journal

That's very unfortunate. We all work hard here investing on crypto making sure that we can secure a bountiful life in the future but by just one little mistake, we can end up loosing it all in a snap. Let us take this unfortunate event as a lesson learned for us to be more careful and more wise with our investment. Always avoid putting too large money on our wallet and always make sure that it is well secured to avoid getting attacked. As soon as you put up a large amount of bitcoin on your wallet, you are already putting yourself at great risk.

[diazepam666]

Really it is a sad story it going to be lessons for all who have weak hands in secure measures. So we have to store our coins in most secure wallet as may people are trusted that with our secure identity. But nowadays the hackers be come too smart and they can find new tricks and ideas to hack people's information so we can not share our information any free paying online website or scam surveys.

But people never understand the actual scams and we people need to choose the right project invest as well as to earn the money or tokens also guys. Most of the people missing that and worrying after they got scammed.

Apart from that some bug sites also there like they were scamming us with phishing links.

[Jating]

Which case the OP is referring to?

Crypto Investor Awarded Over $75 Million in SIM-Swapping Hack Case?

AT&T Fails to Win Dismissal in $24 Million Crypto SIM-Swap Lawsuit

For the record though, Michael Terpin was hacked twice already, he won the first case and awarded $75 million.

I'm not saying that it's his fault, but he should should learn his lessons from the first attack and keep his BTC in a safe place.

[batang_bitcoin]

Yes, this was the news last year.

Bitcoin Investor Sues AT&T After Losing $23 Million In SIM Swap Hack

he had 1.5k$ BTC which is crazy and foolish in the same time to not have extra security for such a big amount.

FTFY, bro.
I don't know why he didn't even think of storing that to a safer storage during that time.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Oh shit, that's scary and this guy must be devastated.

Op, I'm glad you posted this else I would never have learned about this kind of hack, even if it was old news.  I still hadn't heard about it.  It wouldn't matter for the bitcoin I own, since I don't keep it on an exchange or a web wallet or anything, but the SIM swapping thing could be used for anything else I suppose. 

It does make me wonder how he got targeted in the first place, since someone must have known he owned all that bitcoin, no?  I can't imagine getting hacked for that much.  I'm not sure how I'd recover, if at all.  The guy who got hacked is probably wealthy (hopefully) and I'm hoping he bounced back from this eventually.  Is there no followup story?