A Palm Coast man who called himself “King Bob” and was arrested earlier this year as part of a cryptocurrency heist of at least $800,000 is now facing additional federal charges as part of a “phishing scheme” to steal confidential information and cryptocurrency, according to prosecutors in California.
Noah Michael Urban, 20, was among four men indicted by a federal grand jury each on one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of conspiracy, and one count of aggravated identity theft, according to a statement this week from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California.
Urban was already indicted earlier this year on eight counts of wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and five counts of aggravated identity theft, according to a Jan. 11 announcement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida.
Urban used aliases including “Sosa,” “Elijah,” “Gustavo Fring” and “King Bob,” the previous indictment stated.
Urban was already in custody awaiting his trial in federal court in Jacksonville. The trial had been set to begin in December but was continued to February.
Now Urban faces new charges in California.
Palm Coast man faces new cryptocurrency-theft related charges
The other men facing the same charges as Urban in the phishing scheme were; Ahmed Hossam Eldin Elbadawy, 23, a.k.a. “AD,” of College Station, Texas; Evans Onyeaka Osiebo, 20, of Dallas, Texas; and Joel Martin Evans, 25, a.k.a. “joeleoli,” of Jacksonville, North Carolina.
Federal prosecutors also unsealed a complaint charging Tyler Robert Buchanan, 22, of the United Kingdom, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy, wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft.
The FBI found that the conspirators targeted at least 45 companies in a variety of nations, including the United States, Canada, India and the United Kingdom.
Urban and the other men launched “phishing attacks” between September 2021 and April 2023 by sending mass text messages to cell phones of numerous employees. The text messages claimed to be from the company or a business service provider of the company.
The phishing tests often warned that the employees’ accounts were about to be deactivated and contained links to legitimate looking company websites but were actually phishing sites. Some workers clicked on the ink and entered their credentials on the phishing websites, sometimes authenticating their identifies by way of two-factor authentication sent to their cellphones, the release stated.
The conspirators then used the stolen credentials to gain access to the employees’ accounts and the computer systems belonging to the companies. Once in the systems, they stole confidential information, including personal identifying information and account access credentials.
Federal prosecutors: Millions in crypto stolen
Using the stolen information, the conspirators stole millions of dollars’ worth of virtual currency from cryptocurrency accounts belonging to numerous people.
The criminal complaint listed 10 people from whom the conspirators stole cryptocurrency. The thefts ranged from nine bitcoin worth $267,000 stolen from a person identified as E.V. to more than $40,000 taken in various types of bitcoin taken from a person identified as J.G., the complaint stated. Other individuals were hit with cryptocurrency thefts worth $199,000 in ether and $182,000, $129,000 and 1,668,000 in bitcoin, according to the complaint.
If convicted, each of the accused would face a maximum 20 years in federal prison for conspiracy to commit wire fraud, up to five years for the conspiracy, and a mandatory two-year consecutive prison sentence for aggravated identity theft. Additionally, Buchanan would face up to 20 years in prison for the wire fraud count.
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: ‘King Bob’ from Palm Coast facing more federal charges in crypto heist
