Report: ‘Vast Majority’ of WannaCry Hero’s Legal Fund ‘Fraudulent Donations’

All legal fee donations to cyber security researcher Marcus Hutchins will be refunded following the discovery that the majority were made fraudulently with stolen credit cards.

According to BuzzFeed, “The vast majority of money raised to pay for the legal defense of beloved British cyber security researcher Marcus Hutchins was donated with stolen or fake credit card numbers.”

“Lawyer Tor Ekeland, who managed the fund, said at least $150,000 of the money collected came from fraudulent sources, and that the prevalence of fraudulent donations effectively voided the entire fundraiser,” they claimed. “He said he’d been able to identify only about $4,900 in legitimate donations, but that he couldn’t be certain even of those.”

“I don’t want to take the risk, so I just refunded everything,” said Ekeland to BuzzFeed. “One person had five different charges to his account… Odd numbers, the kind you’ll glance over when looking at your bill.”

This month, 22-year-old Hutchins was arrested at the Def Con hacking conference in Las Vegas on charges he allegedly helped to create and sell a malware tool that targeted bank accounts in 2014.

Hutchins had previously been heralded as a hero after he managed to stop the crippling WannaCry global cyberattack in May, which targeted both private and public organizations, including the United Kingdom’s National Healthcare Service.

Following news of his arrest, Ekeland had claimed that Hutchins could potentially be jailed for up to 40 years.

“Would he get that? I doubt it, it would be a bizarre outcome,” he continued. “Is it possible? It sure is.”

Ekeland hasn’t yet decided what to do with donations made in Bitcoin, which total $3,400 from 96 different people.