Canadian Man Pleads Guilty to Snowflake Data Extortion Spree

Connor Riley Moucka, a 26-year-old from Kitchener, Ontario, has pleaded guilty to computer fraud and conspiracy charges related to a wave of attacks against companies using the cloud data storage provider Snowflake. Moucka was previously identified as one of the most significant cybercrime threat actors of 2024.

According to the report, Moucka admitted to hacking and extorting more than 165 organisations that stored data with Snowflake, and to stealing call and text history records belonging to more than 100 million AT&T customers. The case highlights how attackers increasingly target cloud data platforms directly, exploiting weak account security at customer organisations rather than breaching the cloud provider itself.

This case is a reminder that businesses using third party cloud storage remain responsible for securing their own accounts and access credentials, even when the underlying platform itself is not compromised.