Man confesses to hacking Apple accounts belonging to musicians and athletes

• Kwamaine Jerell Ford of Dacula, Georgia has admitted to stealing money from compromised Apple accounts.
• Ford primarily targeted NBA and NFL players, as well as rappers, in his phishing scams.

A Georgian man has admitted to hacking Apple accounts of prominent sportspersons and musicians. The 27-year old Kwamaine Jerell Ford used phishing emails to lure victims into giving their login credentials.

The man from Dacula created fake accounts to impersonate Apple’s customer service and then charted out large scale phishing campaigns. Ford’s phishing scheme was believed to have started in 2015.

The big picture

• The spoofed emails either had a message asking users to reset their passwords or to access videos sent to them.
• Once the victim entered his/her credentials, Ford would have this information to login into their account.
• It has been reported that he had complete account takeover done through password resets, changed email addresses and altering other security authentication methods.
• More than hundreds of successful logins were attempted by the Georgian man as a result.
• As of now, the identities of high-profile victims have not been made public.

Benefitted from compromised accounts

Credit card information stolen from phishing was used to make purchases, as well as to transfer money into his accounts.

“After gaining control of the victims’ accounts, Ford found credit card information belonging to several of the victims. Ford then used the stolen credit card numbers to pay for thousands of dollars in air travel, hotel stays, other travel expenses, furniture, and money transfers to online payment accounts under his control,” the Department of Justice stated, in a news release.

Ford was apprehended on April 17, 2018, on multiple accounts of frauds. However, he pleaded guilty to two charges - computer fraud and aggravated identity theft. Ford’s sentencing is scheduled on June 24, 2019.