A 26-year-old Alabama man was sentenced to 14 months in prison for hacking into the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) X account. Eric Council Jr. used a technique called “SIM swapping” to gain control of the account. This allowed him to post a fake message saying the SEC had approved Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). The false post caused Bitcoin’s price to surge by over $1,000.
The Hacking Incident
The SEC’s X account was compromised in January 2024, just before the official approval of Bitcoin ETFs. The fake post read, “Today, the SEC approves