Former SEC Account Intruder Announces Bitcoin ETF Approval, Hacker Faces Trial

February 11th. According to Bloomberg, a 25-year-old man from Alabama named Eric Council Jr. has admitted to being involved in the hacking of the "X" account of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In January of the previous year, he posted a false message on the platform announcing the approval of the first Bitcoin spot ETF. Eric Council Jr. pleaded guilty on Monday in a federal court in Washington to conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft and access device fraud. Judge Amy Berman Jackson is scheduled to sentence him on May 16th. Prosecutors accused Eric Council Jr. of using forged identification and deceiving an employee at a local cell phone store to assist him in hacking into the victim's phone. The day before the SEC account was hacked, analysts predicted that the SEC would announce the approval of a spot Bitcoin ETF. This hacker's fake post on January 9, 2024, led to a significant increase in the price of Bitcoin. Subsequently, the SEC confirmed that the announcement was unauthorized, and the cryptocurrency price immediately fell. The following day, the SEC officially announced the approval of the spot Bitcoin ETF.