Eric Council Jr., a resident of Alabama, has acknowledged his involvement in a SIM swap incident to take control of the social media accounts of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in January 2024. He then proceeded to post fake information about the supposed approval of several bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) applications, manipulating the market in the process.

Council pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit aggravated identity theft and device fraud and will be sentenced on May 16. Prosecutors claimed that Council tricked an employee with a fake ID to access the victim’s phone, which was identified by con-conspirators as the device controlling SEC’s X account.

The announcement caused a surge in bitcoin’s price for brief moments. However, the SEC quickly regained control of the account and clarified the situation, prompting a sudden drop and erasing the gains of the announcement.

Attackers took advantage of the expectations that the market had about the approval of the first series of bitcoin ETFs and hoped to capitalize on the effects of such an announcement.

The plea puts an end to an investigation and judicial battle that started in January 2024, when the SEC revealed that it had been the victim of a SIM swap attack, and progressed with the arrest of Council in October, with authorities emphasizing their commitment to pursue justice in this kind of cyber crimes.

Read more: SEC Got SIM Swapped: How Hacker Gained Control of SEC’s X Account

Read more: FBI Arrests Alabama Man in Connection With SEC X Account Hack That Spiked Bitcoin Prices

The attack prompted changes in the security policies of the organization, which acknowledged that it had disabled multi-factor authentication (MFA) prior to this event because it had faced difficulties accessing the account.

In January, doing a postmortem on the hacking incident, the SEC stated that MFA was currently “enabled for all SEC social media accounts that offer it.”

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