U.S. Soldier Gets 70 Months for Telecom Extortion

Confirmed. A U.S. Army soldier was sentenced Thursday to 70 months in federal prison for hacking multiple telecommunications carriers and extorting them with stolen subscriber data. KrebsOnSecurity has the full sentencing record.

The soldier, an active-duty communications specialist at the time of the offenses, pleaded guilty. He obtained call records and text metadata for more than 100 million AT&T customers during 2024, then sent extortion demands to AT&T and Verizon threatening to publish the data unless payment was received. Neither carrier paid. The FBI arrested him in late 2024; he has been in custody since.

Seventy months is just under six years. There is no parole under federal sentencing guidelines; the full term will be served.

The sentence is higher than comparable cases reported here recently. A Ryuk ransomware operator received two years last week. Ukrainian Conti developer Oleksii Lytvynenko received four years earlier this month after extradition from Ireland. Two Scattered Spider affiliates in the U.K. received 5.5 years in July for the Transport for London intrusion.

Analysis: the active-duty military status is a plausible factor in the elevated sentence relative to those ransomware-member cases. The court’s sentencing memorandum was not available in published reporting at time of writing. Unconfirmed; treat accordingly.