On Friday, a federal court sentenced Joseph James O’Conner to five years in prison for his involvement in the 2020 Twitter hack. Last month, the 24-year-old, known online as PlugwalkJoe, pleaded guilty to a series of cybercrimes including conducting a SIM-swapping attack that targeted a TikTok account with millions of followers. Through the 2020 Twitter hack, O’Conner and his accomplices gained access to the company’s backend and subsequently the accounts of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Barack Obama and more than 100 other high-profile users. O’Conner made a net profit of $794,000 on the crypto scam that followed.
“After stealing and fraudulently redirecting the stolen cryptocurrency, O’Connor and his co-conspirators laundered it through dozens of transfers and transactions, and exchanged some of it for bitcoin using cryptocurrency exchange services,” the Justice Department said. “Ultimately, some of the stolen cryptocurrency was deposited into a cryptocurrency account controlled by O’Connor.” In 2021, Graham Ivan Clark, the alleged juvenile mastermind behind the breach, pleaded guilty in exchange for a three-year prison sentence. In addition to his five-year sentence, O’Conner also faces three years of supervised release after his sentence. He also has to forfeit the $794,000 he stole during the hack.