The perpetrators of hundreds of swatting attacks across the United States have been exposed after law enforcement compiled digital footprints left on some of the internet's biggest platforms, according to court records released this week in California. The state's teen prosecutors claim.
Alan Winston Filion, 17, of Lancaster, California, was charged in Seminole County, Florida, with four felonies related to swatting, or false threats to induce police to respond aggressively, according to Florida prosecutors. ing. Police arrested Fillion on Jan. 18 and he was extradited to Seminole County this week.
Fillion's arrest, first reported by WIRED on January 26, comes after police say he is responsible for mass attacks and threats against a high school, a historically black university, a mosque, and federal employees. This was the culmination of a multi-agency search for the person. Bomb the Pentagon, the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. Supreme Court. Ultimately, it will be related to your YouTube channel, Discord chat, and username. Lord of the Ring He helped lead authorities to Filion's doorstep.
Florida prosecutors charged Fillion with four felonies, three related to allegations of making false reports to law enforcement and one related to authorities targeting people based on race. It alleges the illegal use of a two-way radio to “promote or encourage acts of terrorism.” Religious or other protected class. Prosecutors claim that Fillion is “responsible for hundreds of swatting and bomb threat incidents across the United States,” but the charges against Fillion were filed on May 12, 2023, in Sanford, Florida. Associated with a single swatting attack on the Masjid Al-Khai Mosque in .
Fillion's attorney did not immediately respond to WIRED's request for comment.
More than a year before the swatting attack on the Florida mosque, agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation interviewed Fillion's father, William, at his home in Lancaster, California, according to court documents released Wednesday. The interview took place on April 21, 2022, the same day the owner of a Telegram channel associated with swatting activity posted, “Someone reported me to the FBI…lol!”
In October 2022, authorities investigating a swatting incident related to calls made to a school in Anacortes, Washington, discovered Telegram users involved in multiple swatting and personal information transmission channels. According to the same court documents, user “Nazgul Swattings” claimed responsibility for threats against Washington schools on one of these channels.
Over the next several months, the FBI monitored channels associated with the user, according to court records. One of the channels, called Torswats (formerly Nazgul Swats), has made nearly two dozen threats against locations across the country, including schools in Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Texas. shared a recording of the hoax call.
While the FBI tracked Tawswatts' public channel, private investigator Brad “Cuffrozen” Dennis was conducting his own parallel investigation on behalf of the prominent Twitch streamer who was swatted. In December, Dennis contacted the users behind Torswats and asked them to chat on a peer-to-peer chat service called Tox under the guise of swat orders. Although not mentioned in the arrest warrant, Dennis used Wireshark to monitor network traffic while communicating on Tox, according to records shared with WIRED. In the process, he revealed his IP address and username “Paimon Arnum”, which was previously unknown to law enforcement.