A British hacker accused of orchestrating a $3.75m insider buying and selling scheme has been charged within the US.
Robert Westbrook, 39, allegedly gained unauthorized entry to company executives’ e-mail accounts to revenue from confidential monetary data.
US authorities arrested Westbrook final week in London, and he’s awaiting extradition to face a number of costs, together with securities fraud and wire fraud.
Between January 2019 and Might 2020, Westbrook is alleged to have hacked into the Microsoft Workplace 365 accounts of executives at 5 US corporations.
In accordance with court docket paperwork, he used this entry to assemble personal earnings data, which he then used to make trades earlier than the businesses’ bulletins, leading to vital earnings.
Authorities declare that Westbrook repeatedly carried out auto-forwarding guidelines to ship emails from the compromised accounts to his personal. He additionally took a number of steps to cover his identification, together with utilizing VPN providers, nameless e-mail accounts and cryptocurrency.
The US Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC) has filed a civil grievance in opposition to Westbrook, whereas the Division of Justice (DoJ) has initiated prison proceedings.
“The SEC is engaged in ongoing efforts to guard markets and buyers from the implications of cyber fraud,” warned Jorge G. Tenreiro, performing chief of the SEC’s Crypto Property and Cyber Unit.
“As this case demonstrates, despite the fact that Westbrook took a number of steps to hide his identification – together with utilizing nameless e-mail accounts, VPN providers and using bitcoin – the Fee’s superior knowledge analytics, crypto asset tracing and expertise can uncover fraud even in instances involving refined worldwide hacking.”
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If convicted, Westbrook faces extreme penalties. Every securities and wire fraud cost carries a most jail sentence of 20 years, whereas every rely of pc fraud might add 5 years. He may be required to pay hundreds of thousands in fines and could also be completely barred from buying and selling securities.
