For many years, the cryptocurrency industry has waited with bated breath for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to finally approve Bitcoin ETFs. Finally, on Wednesday the SEC granted this wish, announcing the approval for “a number of spot bitcoin exchange-traded product (ETP) shares.”
But this was not before a hacker had the first laugh.
Tuesday afternoon, a day prior, the official X account of the SEC was hacked, and a false announcement was released, declaring the approval of Bitcoin ETFs.
In the brief period before this false tweet would be deleted and debunked by the SEC, the cryptocurrency industry celebrated this momentous decision. The markets even reflected this excitement, as Bitcoin spiked to a price of $48,000 following the release of the fraudulent tweet.
The excitement was quickly snuffed, however, when the post was taken down and SEC Chair Gary Gensler announced that the announcement had been the result of an unidentified hacker having taken control of the SEC’s official X account for a short period.
Following this event, the SEC is currently investigating the incident alongside law enforcement to discover the person or persons behind the hack, and the purpose behind it.
According to Roger Grimes, Data-Driven Defense Evangelist at KnowBe4, “The hacker could have been someone who wanted to profit on the temporary BTC pricing jump on the fake ne ..
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