How the FBI and Mandiant caught a 'serial hacker' who tried to fake his own death | TechCrunch

A doctor’s user account used to file a Hawaii death certificate was hacked by Jesse Kipf , a hacker nicknamed “ FreeRadical ” The hacker posted a fake death certificate on a hacking forum in an attempt to monetize the access they had to the system.

A threat analyst at Google 's Mandiant spotted the post online as part of their routine threat intelligence gathering, which includes monitoring cybercrime forums.

A federal investigation would reveal that the doctor's user account was compromised by none other than KipF himself.

Mandiant identified the FreeRadical and GhostMarket09 personas as being connected to UNC3944, or Scattered Spider , a prolific hacking and cybercrime group allegedly behind the MGM Resorts hack.

The FBI had received a report from the National Cyber Forensics Training Alliance , a non-profit that monitors the dark web and collaborates with law enforcement and the private sector.

The investigation led to Kentucky because Kipf had apparently forgotten to use a VPN at least once when accessing the Hawaii death registry systems, exposing his home IP address.

Kipf admitted to causing $ 80,000 in damages to government and corporate networks he hacked.

He also admitted to identity theft, for using doctor’s stolen credentials in the Hawaii hack to create the death certificate.

He was sentenced to 81 months in prison for 81 months , just shy of seven years .