The College Student Who Stole $7.5M via SIM Swapping Joel Ortiz grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, and his mother was an immigrant from Puerto Rico with a 100% disability due to a back injury. Joel …More
The College Student Who Stole $7.5M via SIM Swapping
Joel Ortiz grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, and his mother was an immigrant from Puerto Rico with a 100% disability due to a back injury.
Joel Ortiz was arrested at LAX, dressed head to toe in ostentations and gaudy Gucci, as he was about to fly to Europe with $250,000 in cash converted from cryptocurrency that he’d stolen from at least 40 victims a few months earlier to the tune of $7.5 million. Tracked by REACT, a Santa Clara, California cybercrime unit, his irresistible urge to gloat and his over-the-top trail of lavish spending and flaunting of riches on social media made him an easy catch. But how did this one-time high school Valedictorian and Information Technology student at UMass, a kid who grew up in Boston public housing, get here? Was this smart and tech-savvy but socially awkward loner really the mastermind or was he being manipulated by a larger criminal Community?
VICE
Joel Ortiz grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, and his mother was an immigrant from Puerto Rico with a 100% disability due to a back injury.
Joel Ortiz was arrested at LAX, dressed head to toe in ostentations and gaudy Gucci, as he was about to fly to Europe with $250,000 in cash converted from cryptocurrency that he’d stolen from at least 40 victims a few months earlier to the tune of $7.5 million. Tracked by REACT, a Santa Clara, California cybercrime unit, his irresistible urge to gloat and his over-the-top trail of lavish spending and flaunting of riches on social media made him an easy catch. But how did this one-time high school Valedictorian and Information Technology student at UMass, a kid who grew up in Boston public housing, get here? Was this smart and tech-savvy but socially awkward loner really the mastermind or was he being manipulated by a larger criminal Community?
VICE
