Despite the payment and deletion, some AT&T customers and those who communicated with them could still be at risk, given that others may have samples of the data that was not deleted.
The hacker who spoke to WIRED got the payment from AT&T instead of Binns because, he says, in a strange twist to the case, Binns was arrested in Turkey in May for an unrelated breach dating back to 2021. That one involved a massive theft of data from T-Mobile. AT&T said in its SEC filing that it believed “at least one person” associated with the breach had already been detained, but did not identify him. 404 Media was First to report on Friday that Binns is allegedly that person.
Binns was charged in 2022 with 12 counts related to the 2021 T-Mobile hack “and the theft and sale of confidential files and information” involving data on more than 40 million people. However, Binns had moved from the United States to Turkey in 2018 with his Turkish mother, according to a report. Interview he gave three years ago The Wall Street Journal. The accusation remained sealed Until this year. Last September, the United States learned that he might be arrested in Turkey and extradited to the United States because he did not have Turkish citizenship. Prosecutors in Seattle, near T-Mobile’s headquarters, asked a U.S. court in December to make public parts of the indictment so they could hand it, along with an arrest warrant, to Turkish authorities, who were making the final decision on whether Binns could legally be extradited under Turkish law. The court granted the request to make the indictments public in January.
The hacker who received the AT&T payment told WIRED that he believes Binns was arrested in Turkey around May 5, as Binns did not respond to any attempts by him or others to contact him. WIRED reached out to the Seattle public defender representing Binns in the T-Mobile case but did not receive a response.
Binns has had contact with U.S. authorities on several occasions and has accused the CIA and other agencies of wild plots to harm and entrap him. As part of a 2020 Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the FBI, CIA and U.S. Special Operations Command to obtain records he claimed to have on him, Binns claimed CIA contractors spied on him, experimented on him, harassed him and that one of them held a “psychotronic weapon” to his head and used a microwave oven to shock him, among other allegations. He later filed a motion to dismiss his case under the Freedom of Information Act, claiming he had submitted some documents while “experiencing a psychological episode brought on by intoxication.”
Last October, in the T-Mobile case, Binns wrote to the U.S. District Court in Seattle and said he believed his actions were affected by a chip that had been implanted in his brain when he was an infant. In a certified letter sent to the court, and seen by WIRED, Binns told the judge he believed a “wireless brain stimulation (basal ganglia) implant or device implanted” shortly after his birth was responsible for “erratic behavior including irresistible impulses, artificial neurological problems, and the possible commission of crimes.”
The timeline suggests that if Binns is responsible for the AT&T breach, he allegedly did so when he likely already knew he was indicted for the T-Mobile hack and could face arrest for it.