Where most 19-year-olds are taking their first steps into adulthood in their quest to figure out who they are, 19-year-old Matthew D. Lane already knows exactly who he is: a teenager who stole the personal data of tens of millions of children and attempted to ransom it for Bitcoin.
The Massachusetts teen just pled guilty to a handful of federal cybercrimes. These include cyber extortion, aggravated identity theft, and unauthorized access to protected computers.
Prosecutors say Lane used stolen credentials to infiltrate a major unnamed cloud company. However, PowerSchool, a K-12 educational tech company that stores personal info for students and teachers across North America, seems like the likely victim.
Once inside, the teen hacker siphoned off a staggering amount of data. Social Security numbers, birthdays, medical records, passwords, addresses. Enough to commandeer as many Fortnite and Roblox accounts as he wanted.
Then came the extortion. Prosecutors say Lane, or someone with access to the stolen data, sent a message demanding $2.85 million worth of bitcoin, which was around 30 coins at the time, or else the data would be “leaked worldwide.” That’s 60 million kids and 10 million teachers on the line.
The DOJ says Lane was part of a criminal group that jacked data from a telecom firm and tried to squeeze them for $200,000. The ransom note sent to the company warned execs to “make the correct decision and pay the ransom,” or else the group would leak the data.
Lane wanted to get rich and he figured the best way to expose the personal information of children, and all to collect some fake internet money. It’s only a matter of time before Elon Musk steps out from the shadows of Lane’s prison cell like Nick Fury to ask Lane if he wants to join DOGE.
