Teen Behind Twitter Hack Agrees to Three Years in Prison

The teenager behind last summer's Twitter hack that targeted several prominent profiles and generated more than $100,000 in Bitcoin has pleaded guilty and agreed to serve three years in prison.

Graham Ivan Clark was 17 years old when he was accused of the attack that took over Twitter accounts of President Joe Biden, former President Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, Apple, Uber, and other high-profile accounts to distribute a Bitcoin scam.

Tweets posted from the hijacked accounts urged viewers to send Bitcoin to a specific address, with a promise it would be returned doubled if they sent the virtual currency within 30 minutes or an hour. The tweets generated more than $100,000 before Twitter took them down.

It later came to light that the attackers used a phone spear-phishing attack against Twitter employees, whose credentials they used to tweet from these accounts, access direct messages, and download data. 

Clark, now 18, was one of three arrested for the breach. His agreement lets him be sentenced as a "youthful offender," meaning he avoids a minimum 10-year sentence he would have faced if convicted as an adult, the Tampa Bay Times reports. He will serve three years in a state prison for young adults, followed by three years of probation. 

The plea agreement requires Clark be banned from using computers without permission and supervision by law enforcement, the report states. He will also be required to turn over the passwords for accounts he controls and submit to searches of his property. Clark has also handed over cryptocurrency acquired in the breach. 

Read more details in the full report here.