US prosecutors unveiled criminal charges on Wednesday against five alleged members of Scattered Spider, a loose-knit community of hackers suspected of breaking into dozens of US companies to steal confidential information and cryptocurrency.
Martin Estrada, the US Attorney in Los Angeles, said the defendants conducted phishing attacks by sending bogus but real-looking mass text messages to employees’ mobile phones warning that their accounts would be deactivated.
The hackers, in their teens or 20s at the time, allegedly directed employees to links for entering log-in information, enabling the hackers to steal from their employers and millions of dollars of cryptocurrency from individuals’ accounts.
Victims allegedly included at least 12 companies in the gaming, outsourcing, telecommunications and cryptocurrency fields, plus hundreds of thousands of individuals.
Estrada’s office confirmed that the case concerned Scattered Spider. No victims were identified by name.
Security experts and officials have said Scattered Spider is composed of small clusters of people, including youngsters, who collaborate on-and-off on specific jobs.
The group has been blamed for unusually aggressive cybercrime sprees, targeting major multinational companies as well as individual cryptocurrency investors.
Some experts previously complained about law enforcement’s apparent inability to crack down even though the identities of some suspects, including several living in Western countries, were known, industry insiders told Reuters last year.
That may now be changing.
“The days of easy money and no consequences are over,” said Allison Nixon, chief research officer at cybersecurity company Unit 221B. “Defenders and law enforcement are meeting this wave of cybercrime aggressively now. Young people that have fallen into online crime culture need to exit before they become the next target.”
The defendants are Tyler Buchanan, 22, of Scotland; Ahmed Elbadawy, 23, of College Station, Texas; Joel Evans, 25, of Jacksonville, North Carolina; Evans Osiebo, 20, of Dallas; and Noah Urban, 20, of Palm Coast, Florida.
Each was charged with two conspiracy counts and aggravated identity theft, and Buchanan was also charged with wire fraud.
Investigators traced Buchanan through domain registration records for phishing websites, registered under an account whose user name included the name of late actor Bob Saget.
Officials said the suspects’ illegal activity spanned from September 2021 and April 2023.
Scattered Spider drew particular notoriety in September 2023 when members of its community broke into and locked up the networks of casino operators Caesars Entertainment and MGM Resorts International, and demanded hefty ransom payments. Caesars paid about $15 million to restore its network.
It was unclear whether these five defendants were connected with Scattered Spider’s casino hackings.
The Department of Justice declined to comment on specific victims. Caesars did not immediately return requests for comment. MGM said the defendants did not appear to be related to the cyber attack against its network.
Evans was arrested on Tuesday in North Carolina. Urban has pleaded not guilty to 14 fraud and conspiracy charges in a separate case in Florida.
Buchanan was arrested in June at an airport in Palma de Mallorca, Spain as he attempted to board a flight to Naples, Spanish authorities said at the time. He is awaiting extradition from Spain, a Justice Department spokesman said.
A public defender representing Urban did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Lawyers for the other defendants could not immediately be identified.
CHICAGO — There is no stopping Cal Raleigh at the moment.
Raleigh has a major-league-leading 31 homers after he helped the Seattle Mariners take two of three against the Chicago Cubs over the weekend. The switch-hitter went deep four times and drove in six runs in the series.
“Just trying to have good at-bats, really,” Raleigh said. “Trying to stay consistent. Really just trying to home in on my approach and not worry too much about what the pitcher is trying to do to me.”
Raleigh had two hits, walked twice and scored three runs in Seattle’s 14-6 victory Sunday. He is batting .327 (37-for-113) with 16 homers and 34 RBIs in his past 29 games.
Raleigh was the designated hitter for the series finale after being behind the plate Saturday. He hammered the first pitch of his at-bat against Colin Rea — a 93.8 mph fastball — for a two-run shot in the top of the first on a hot afternoon at Wrigley Field. The massive drive to center had an exit velocity of 105 mph.
The DH walked in the third and singled and scored in the fifth. After popping out softly for the final out of the sixth, he walked again in the eighth and scored on Randy Arozarena‘s two-run double.
“Thirty-one home runs, he just continues to march through history here,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson said. “It’s fun to watch. … He’s a smart player, so later in the game, not getting too anxious, not trying to out of the zone, not trying to get away from his identity as a hitter and who he is. Just staying right where he needs to stay.”
The 28-year-old Raleigh, who agreed to a $105 million, six-year contract with Seattle in March, is the first switch-hitter to mash at least 30 homers before the All-Star break. He needs four more homers to match Ken Griffey Jr. for the most before the break in Mariners history.
“I think a lot of people don’t watch to pitch to him, and then if you do and fall behind, he hits a lot of homers, obviously,” Seattle pitcher Logan Gilbert said. “He can beat you in a lot of different ways, and it seems like he’s doing it every game, too.”
“I was so sweaty. My socks were wet. Everything had just slipped straight out,” he said.
Chisholm doubled twice, including a go-ahead, two-run drive off the right-center-field wall in the eighth inning, then slid into catcher Gary Sánchez for the final run as New York put the shoe on the other foot, so to speak. The AL East-leading Yankees won their second straight after losing seven of eight in a game that will be remembered for Chisholm’s size 10½ Jordan 1 spikes.
Shoeless Joe supposedly was given his nickname on June 6, 1908, playing semipro ball for the independent Greenville Spinners against the Anderson Electricians. New cleats had caused blisters, and he took them off and hit a long home run in the seventh inning.
Jackson won a World Series title with the Chicago White Sox in 1917, then was among eight players on the so-called “Black Sox” who were banned for life after they were accused of intentionally losing the 1919 Series to Cincinnati in exchange for money from gamblers. He finished with a .356 average in 13 major league seasons.
Asked whether he should be called Shoeless Jazz, Chisholm responded: “Wow. Is that how Shoeless Joe got his name? He ran out of his shoe?” When told Jackson earned the nickname in the 1910s, Chisholm quipped: “Oh, so he wasn’t wearing shoes.”
“I saw a lot of firsts,” Yankees captain Aaron Judge said. “11:30 game to a guy losing both his shoes. I’ve seen one cleat kind of running but not both like that. That was awesome.”
Chisholm is hitting .350 (21-for-60) with 11 RBIs since returning from a strained right oblique that caused him to miss 28 games. He raised his average to .242.
“That’s what I live for. That’s how I grew up playing baseball in high school, little league,” he said. “I don’t feel like it’s no need to change.”
New York trailed 2-0 when Chisholm hit a two-out double off Dean Kremer and headed for home on DJ LeMahieu‘s single to left.
“They say he’s the best shoe tier. I didn’t understand it until he actually did. It took me like a minute to take off my shoes just now.”
Jazz Chisholm Jr. on asking rookie Jasson Domínguez to tie his laces after putting on fresh socks and his spikes
Chisholm’s left shoe popped off between third and home. Seeing rookie catcher Maverick Handley move to his left for Colton Cowser‘s throw up the third-base line, Chisholm tried to veer to avoid contact. He caught the catcher with his right arm as Cowser was spun to the ground and the ball popped out of his mitt. Chisholm fell past the plate as the right shoe was jarred off and from his knees slapped a hand across the plate.
“He had dirt all over his face when I walked out there to get him. Looked like glitter on his face,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “We were all kind of screaming.”
After he reached the dugout, Chisholm stretched out with his stockinged feet on the bench. He put on a fresh pair of socks and then his spikes, and Chisholm asked rookie Jasson Domínguez to tie the laces.
“They say he’s the best shoe tier,” Chisholm recalled in the postgame clubhouse. “I didn’t understand it until he actually did. It took me like a minute to take off my shoes just now.”
Baltimore led 2-1 in the eighth when Ben Rice singled leading off against Bryan Baker for his third hit. Giancarlo Stanton singled to put runners at the corners, and Paul Goldschmidt pinch ran for his fellow former MVP — the first pinch-running appearance of Goldschmidt’s big league career, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
Baker fell behind 3-0 in the count and left a belt-high fastball over the plate. Chisholm drove it 384 feet off the middle of the wall.
“I wasn’t going to swing if it wasn’t a fastball,” he said.
Goldschmidt, 37, slid in just ahead of Sánchez’s tag. Chisholm was a minor leaguer in Arizona’s system when Goldschmidt starred for the Diamondbacks.
“He was the guy that everybody really watched doing baserunning,” Chisholm said. “Even when I got to Miami, he was still the blueprint of how to run the bases.”
Goldschmidt took pride in his baserunning.
“It’s something that wasn’t secondary behind hitting and defense,” he said.
Chisholm took third on the throw and LeMahieu followed with a chopper to shortstop Gunnar Henderson, who threw home. Chisholm slid headfirst and was at first called out by umpire Jansen Visconti, who didn’t realize Sánchez dropped the ball as he applied the tag.
His first run, however, was the one that will live on in replays for the flying footwear.
“Go out there. Keep playing like that,” Stanton had told him. “You don’t need them.”
Alvarez, however, has struggled at the plate this season, hitting .236 with three home runs and 11 RBIs in 35 games. He has an OPS of .652 with 38 strikeouts.
Alvarez, 23, was baseball’s No. 1 prospect in 2022 and hit 25 home runs as a rookie in 2023. In parts of four seasons with the Mets since debuting in 2022, Alvarez is a .223 hitter with 40 homers and 122 RBIs in 263 games.
Senger, 28, made his major league debut this season with the Mets, appearing in 13 games and hitting .179 in 28 at-bats.
The Mets (46-31) enter Sunday night’s game against the Phillies (46-31) tied for first place in the National League East standings.