18 Year Old Japanese Hacker Stole Crypto Worth 15 Million Yen

Japanese authorities have recently referred an 18-year-old hacker to prosecutors, on the charge of stealing cryptocurrency worth 15 million Yen. This incident took place in the Japanese city of Utsunomiya and was reported in the local news outlet.

According to reports, the teenager hacker hacked Monappy, which is a digital wallet that can be installed on a smartphone. Authorities claim that the theft took place between Aug. 14 and Sept. 1 of last year. A large number of users, the approximate figure being somewhere around 7000, were affected by the hack.

It is being said that the hacker has already pleaded guilty to the charges against him. He apparently used the Tor software to hide his identity. This software enables users to provide anonymity to the web traffic.

The hacker had submitted several crypto transfer requests to his own account. This overwhelmed the entire system and as a result, more funds were directed to his account. He then sent the coins to a different cryptocurrency operator and received dividends in return.

The police ultimately caught the hacker by analyzing the communication records stored on the website’s server.

Since he is a minor, the hacker’s identity is not being revealed to the public. In Japan, anybody who is under 20 years is considered a minor.

Such incidents are not unheard of in the cryptocurrency sector. Many such hacks infiltrate the system on a regular basis. In 2018 alone, over 7,000 cases of crypto related money laundering were reported to Japanese police. These incidents come to light when the transactions raise certain red flags. The authorities then intercept and figure out what’s wrong.

We need to ensure that such hacks do not take place in the future. For which, the system security needs to be improved and it needs to be invincible. Breaches such as this can take away investor trust in the crypto market.