The accused hackers behind a nearly $250 million Bitcoin (BTC) exploit reportedly shot themselves in the foot in a new leaked recording.
Days ago, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia said authorities are charging California and Connecticut residents Malone Lam, Veer Chatel and Jeandiel Serrano with conspiracy to steal and launder $250 million in Bitcoin after robbing 4,100 BTC from a Washington D.C. victim.
In a separate investigation, on-chain sleuth ZachXBT posted a leaked screen share video capturing the moment the accused fraudsters realized that their scheme had apparently worked.
According to the blockchain investigator, one of the hackers even let his real name slip during the recording multiple times.
“Wiz (Veer) received a large % cut from theft and slipped up during screen share by leaking his full name during the theft.
Additional comfort was gained as throughout multiple recordings accomplices referred to him as Veer on audio and in chats.
$34.5M of his funds sit here
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Furthermore, ZachXBT provides a step-by-step breakdown of how the scheme probably went down.
“Incident Summary: On August 19, 2024 the threat actors targeted a single Genesis creditor by:
1) Calling as Google Support via spoofed number to compromise personal accounts
2) Calling after as Gemini support claiming account is hacked
3) Social engineered victim into resetting 2FA and sending Gemini funds to compromised wallet
4) Got victim to use AnyDesk to share screen and leaked private keys from Bitcoin core.”
According to court documents, Lam and Serrano will be asked to forfeit all properties acquired from the theft and pay a money judgment against the defendants if found guilty. At time of writing, no official statements have been made about Chetal by authorities.
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