The Michael Turpin Crypto Heist: Inside the $24M SIM Swap Scam That Changed Everything

Crypto investor Michael Turpin had no idea that stepping away from a conference would trigger one of the most sophisticated digital heists ever recorded. What started as a routine day ended with his accounts drained and a multi-million dollar cryptocurrency theft that would shock the security industry. The mastermind? A 15-year-old named Ellis Pinsky, operating from across the country with a network of teenage conspirators who had infiltrated telecom companies themselves.

How a 15-Year-Old Ellis Pinsky Orchestrated the Biggest SIM Swap Attack

Ellis Pinsky didn’t wake up one day deciding to steal millions in crypto. His journey began much earlier—in a cramped NYC apartment, with a PlayStation 13-year-old gift that sparked an obsession with technology. By his mid-teens, Ellis had progressed from selling stolen Instagram accounts to exploring hacker forums where he learned SQL injection and other exploitation techniques. But selling digital accounts wasn’t thrilling enough; he craved something bigger, something that would give him real power and real money.

The opportunity came through SIM swapping—a technique most people had never heard of. The mechanics were deceptively simple: convince a telecom representative to transfer someone’s phone number to your SIM card. Once you control the phone number, you control everything connected to it. Text messages? Yours. Two-factor authentication codes? Intercepted. Password recovery options? Compromised. From there, accessing email accounts became trivial, and accessing cryptocurrency wallets followed naturally.

The Crypto Takeover: From Phone Hijacking to Wallet Drainage

Ellis assembled a team of accomplices, many barely older than himself. Together, they identified their target: Michael Turpin, a known cryptocurrency investor with substantial holdings. The team bribed telecom workers—a critical vulnerability that would later become the focus of federal investigations—and successfully rerouted Turpin’s phone number to their control.

With Michael Turpin’s phone hijacked, Ellis initiated automated scripts from a Skype call to systematically extract his digital life. The scripts scraped through emails, cloud storage services, and recovery files—essentially performing a digital strip-search of Turpin’s online presence. They were hunting for one thing: wallet private keys and seed phrases.

The initial target seemed like the jackpot: approximately $900 million in Ethereum (ETH) locked in his most valuable wallet. But the significant amount came with security measures Ellis hadn’t anticipated. Frustrated but undeterred, the group dug deeper into Turpin’s other accounts. That’s when they found it—$24 million in cryptocurrency across multiple wallets, less protected than the primary vault. Within hours, the funds flowed from Michael Turpin’s accounts to wallets controlled by Ellis and his conspirators.

The $24M Spend: Luxury Purchases and Quick Downfall

Suddenly wealthy beyond what most teenagers could comprehend, Ellis made purchases that would become the evidence of his downfall. A $100,000 Rolex watch went under his bed. Designer clothes, exotic trips, and nightclub tabs accumulated across major cities. The cryptocurrency had been successfully converted into a lifestyle that screamed “recently rich teenager”—impossible to maintain and impossible to hide.

But the group’s unity fractured under pressure. One team member absconded with $1.5 million, disappearing into the wind. Another member, disturbed or boastful, began discussing hiring someone to commit violence. The camaraderie that had executed a $24 million heist crumbled within weeks under the weight of their own success.

Caught by Trail: How Ellis Pinsky Faced Justice

Truglia, Ellis’s ex-partner in the scheme, became the critical link in the chain of their capture. Unable to resist, Truglia posted on social media with incriminating statements like “Stole $24M. Still can’t keep a friend.” The tweets were carelessly public, easily traceable, and exactly what law enforcement needed. Another mistake proved even more damning: Ellis used his real name on Coinbase while attempting to liquidate portions of the stolen cryptocurrency.

The FBI moved swiftly. Truglia was arrested and imprisoned for his role in what would be classified as the largest individual SIM swap theft ever recorded. Michael Turpin pursued civil legal action, filing a $22 million lawsuit against Ellis. More ominously, Turpin’s home became a target—masked gunmen invaded, suggesting that other parties had learned about the theft and wanted their own form of retaliation or recovery.

From Hacker to Philosophy Student: Ellis Today

Here’s where the story takes an unexpected turn. Ellis, being underage at the time of the crimes, faced remarkably lenient legal consequences—no criminal charges, a decision that some view as fortunate and others as a systemic failure. He returned most of the stolen cryptocurrency and attempted to move forward with his life.

Today, Ellis studies philosophy and computer science at New York University (NYU). By all appearances, he’s trying to leave the chaos behind, build legitimate startups, and somehow repay his debt to society and to Michael Turpin. Whether he succeeds remains an open question.

By the time Ellis turned 15, he had accumulated: 562 Bitcoin, connections to corrupted telecom insiders, an active lawsuit from his victim, and credible threats against his life. The SIM swap attack on Michael Turpin’s crypto holdings became a cautionary tale about how vulnerabilities in telecom infrastructure, combined with young sophistication in hacking, created a perfect storm. It highlighted critical gaps in how cryptocurrency exchanges verify user identity and how telecom companies authenticate account changes—weaknesses that the crypto security industry is still working to address years later.