Michael Terpin Awarded $75 Million in Civil Lawsuit Against Crypto Thief
A U.S. entrepreneur and cryptocurrency investor, Michael Terpin, who SIM swappers stole millions worth of cryptocurrency from has recently been awarded $75.8 million in a civil judgment against a man who was reportedly part of a scheme to defraud him.
According to Reuters, the California Superior Court last week ordered Nicholas Truglia, a 21-year-old New York resident, to pay the amount in compensatory and punitive damages. This is one of the largest judgements awarded to an individual in a cryptocurrency-related case.
Speaking to Reuters, Terpin stated that he filed the civil complaint back in January, after seeing three million tokens get stolen from his cryptocurrency wallet over a SIM swapping attack in early 2018.
At the time, the tokens were reportedly worth around $23.8 million. This, according to a complaint Terpin filed with the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles back in August, in which he sued AT&T, his service provider, for “gross negligence” that caused him to lose the funds.
Truglia and other hackers reportedly fraudulently transferred Terpin’s phone number to a phone to then reset the passwords of his online accounts and steal his cryptocurrency.