Spanish cops cuff Brit bloke accused of playing role in 2020 celeb Twitter hijacking

The Spanish National Police have, at the request of America, arrested UK citizen Joseph O’Connor in Estepona, Spain, in connection with the July 2020 takeover of more than 130 Twitter accounts. The US Department of Justice said that, in addition to the alleged Twitter account joyride, O'Connor, 22, has been charged in a …

[JBowler]

Lost the El Reg black marker?

>We've chosen not to post it due to privacy concerns related to the phone numbers, email addresses, and IP addresses described within

Or, even simpler than the black marker, I suggest these edits, to the three items in question:

1) 123456789

2) 1234@56789

3) 123.45.67.89

So twitter has blocked simple numbers, just like reddit has blocked pi and e. Sad.

[David 132]

Re: Lost the El Reg black marker?

So instead of publishing the suspect’s phone number, you’d have them publish the combination to my luggage instead? Thanks a bunch…

[ChrisPv]

Why not ask UK?

I find it sort of strange that instead of submitting extradition request to allied UK government, USofA prefers to grab suspect in some other allied country.

[FozzyBear]

Re: Why not ask UK?

Whilst the UK does bend over the barrel , just like Australia , for the U.S. It does tend to adhere to certain rules of law. This tends to annoy the U.S as they need to answer some very prickly questions. Like what evidence do you have? Can you prove chain of custody? You know rules of law that "innocents until proven guilty" enjoy in the civilised world.

So they prefer countries where they just throw the victim, oops sorry - criminal over the fence in the hopes the U.S. will leave them alone, or give them stuff.

[lglethal]

Re: Why not ask UK?

Umm if he was living in Spain, then you would ask the Spanish authroties to grab him, wouldnt you?

Just because he's British if he's not actually in the UK, there's not much the UK authorities can do about him, is there?

[ChrisPv]

Re: Why not ask UK?

Was he? Or he was vacationing there?

[Lil Endian]

Re: Why not ask UK?

Doesn't make a difference, Spain was the sovereign territory where he was arrested.

Those thank think their homeland law applies on foreign soils are wrong. I know of one group that strongly believes their law applies everywhere.

I know your question only asked living/vacation, but I just thought it was worth a mention.

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Why not ask UK?

The NYT article refers to "his current home in Spain".

[TeeCee]

...send $1,000 to a Bitcoin address with the promise that the account holder would send twice as much back.

Maybe the Banking industry should give him an award for showing them where they have customers who are way too bloody stupid to be allowed to have their own bank accounts?

As scams go, that one's not even trying to look believable.

[Robert Sneddon]

Maybe the Banking industry should give him an award for showing them where they have customers who are way too bloody stupid to be allowed to have their own bank accounts?

That's the genius of Bitcoin, anyone stupid enough to believe in it is easy pickings for a derivative scam like this.