A Cryptocurrency investor is suing AT&T for $ 224 million. According to the investor, he lost to the tune of $ 24 million after the hijackers were able to clone his SIM. As a result, the cryptocurrency Holdings which he had were lost.
The investor goes by the name of Michael Terpin, who runs the group called Bit Angels. The investor is pretty active in the cryptocurrency community. The $ 24 million are in compensatory damages. The $ 200 million is in punitive damages. The lawsuit was filed at Los Angeles Court.
The investor was a victim of 2 different SIM hijacking attempts. Both of them were successful. As a result, his numbers were ported out. This ensures that the hackers now had access to the SIM and numbers of the victim. As a result, they were able to transfer large holding of cryptocurrencies.
Over a period of time, hackers have devised newer ways to hack cryptocurrency. This is the latest one. Once the SIM is ported out, it is easy to reset the password. Once the password has been reset, it will become easier for the hackers to transfer the cryptocurrency wherever they want. Not just AT&T but there are quite a few other telecom companies which have been the culprit of the same. This is one of the main reasons why SIM authentication is a method is not working anymore. Hackers are able to easily steal the SIM details in order to port out the number. Once the number has been port out, hackers are able to reset the password quite easily.
It is time that the cryptocurrency exchanges think about some new method in order to secure the cryptocurrency Holdings. Only when the cryptocurrency exchanges are able to find out to such method, the cryptocurrency Holdings will be truly same. Up until then, there will always be a risk. As the number of investors grows, the risks will grow as well.
In recent times, there have been many Sims which have been hijacked as well. Many investors have lost money to the same problem. That is why the losses are just going on mounting. Most of the telecom companies think that they are not involved as a normal procedure is taken advantage of by the hackers. However, clearly, the victims think otherwise. It remains to be seen whether any of the other victims file the same suit or whether they think that it is not the problem of telecom providers like AT&T.