A surge in SIM swap attacks has affected several cryptocurrency leaders and organizations, resulting in substantial financial losses and raising concerns about mobile carrier security.
What is a SIM Swap Attack?
The attacks involve duping mobile carriers into transferring a victim's phone number to a hacker-controlled SIM card.
This manipulation grants hackers access to all accounts linked to the compromised phone number.
Among the victims, Mira Murati, OpenAI's CTO, Daniel Alegre, CEO of Bored Ape, and the Aptos Foundation have been targeted.
The pseudonymous crypto detective ZachXBT has revealed that a cumulative loss of over $13 million has been incurred by these individuals.
This kind of cyber assault has been witnessing an uptick in frequency lately.
Noteworthy instances of SIM swap attacks within this year alone encompass the Stellar Development Foundation, LayerZero's CEO Bryan Pellegrino, Y Combinator's CEO Garry Tan, Pleasr DAO, CoinList, and Peter Schiff, among others.
Founder of Blockchain Capital Hacked
Bart Stephens, the founder of Blockchain Capital and an early investor in Coinbase, Kraken, and Worldcoin, encountered one of the most significant breaches.
His case recently culminated in a lawsuit against an unidentified hacker who made off with $6.3 million in a SIM swap scam during May.
The attacker gained access to Stephens' account a day prior and went on to taunt him via email about their capability to remotely manipulate U.S. phone numbers.
The assailant then proceeded to secure a new phone using Stephens' account, shift the phone number to a new SIM card, and exploit this access to reset passwords and circumvent two-factor authentication checks.