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A 22-year-old has been arrested in Twitter, TikTok and Snapchat attacks.


A 22-year-old man was arrested in Spain on Wednesday in connection with the incident. Hacking of more than 100 Twitter accounts Last July, he became the fourth person charged in the incident that led to the temporary shutdown of the social media service.

The man, Joseph O’Connor, is accused of hacking, extortion and cyber-harassment in the Twitter breach in the United States, and hacking the TikTok account of popular creator Addison Rae Easterling and the Snapchat account of actor Bella Thorne. The Department of Justice said.

The Twitter incident started last year when hackers linked to an online forum focused on buying and selling rare usernames, he told The New York Times. They then hacked into Twitter systems by tricking employees into providing their login information, according to legal filings. The files said the hackers used an administrative tool to hijack accounts belonging to political figures and celebrities, including former President Barack Obama, Kanye West and Elon Musk, and used the accounts to commit a Bitcoin scam.

Graham Ivan ClarkAn 18-year-old, whom prosecutors say was the “brain” of the Twitter hack, pleaded guilty to fraud charges in Florida court in March and agreed to serve three years in juvenile jail. Two others, Mason Sheppard and Nima Fazeli, were arrested and charged with brokering Mr. Clark to sell their Twitter account.

Mr. O’Connor was a well-known figure among hackers dealing with usernames, who went by the name “PlugWalkJoe”. By chat logs shared by hackers Last July, The Times and Mr. O’Connor briefly interacted with the group and took the Twitter username @6.

At that time, Mr. O’Connor denied involvement in the Bitcoin scam. “I don’t care,” he said in an interview. “They could arrest me. I’d laugh at them. I didn’t do anything.”

According to a statement submitted by an agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation investigating the breach, Twitter’s logs showed that a Twitter account owned by Mr. O’Connor had displayed several accounts as if he was shopping at the time of the attack.

According to the affidavit, Ms. Thorne’s Snapchat account was hacked in June 2019. According to the affidavit, the hacker threatened to publish the nude photos found on the account unless Ms Thorne sent a tweet thanking her for returning her account.

Instead, Ms. Thorne posted the footage on Twitter. “I feel disgusted, I feel watched, I feel like someone took something from me,” she wrote in a statement accompanying the photos. “I can sleep better tonight knowing I have my power back. You can’t control my life, you never can.”

According to the affidavit, in June 2020, Mr. O’Connor filed false police reports threatening violence at schools, restaurants, an airport and a residence in Southern California. The affidavit stated that the threats were an attempt to investigate a teenager living in the area who clashed with Mr O’Connor online. According to the affidavit, Mr. O’Connor also sent threatening messages and nude photos to the teenager.

In August, a month after the Twitter breach, hackers took over Ms. Easterling’s TikTok account, which has more than 55 million followers. In clear reference to Mr O’Connor’s online nickname, his page has been updated with the message “plugwalkjoe zak n crippin”.

According to the affidavit, the FBI found that Ms. Easterling’s account was accessed by internet protocol addresses associated with Mr. O’Connor at the time of the attack. According to the affidavit, they also found screenshots of Mr. O’Connor’s account registered on Snapchat.

Twitter declined to comment. Representatives of Snap, TikTok, Ms. Thorne, and Ms. Easterling did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Mr O’Connor, who is British, faces extradition to the United States and will be charged in Northern California. Mr. O’Connor’s lawyer could not be immediately identified.



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