FBI supervisory agent pleads guilty to stealing $2.4 million in crypto from nation-state hackers

A senior FBI official has pleaded guilty to stealing millions in cryptocurrency from wallets controlled by nation-state hackers and from victims of crime, The Record reports.

Patrick Steven Yaroch, 37, was a Supervisory Special Agent at FBI Headquarters in the Counterintelligence and Espionage Division, working on an unnamed nation-state. He admitted using his seniority to reach FBI systems holding the codes and passwords needed to move cryptocurrency, and he faces up to 20 years in prison on wire fraud and money laundering charges.

Prosecutors say he made 100 transfers from 79 wallets starting in December 2024, taking more than $2.4 million in total. The wallets were connected to 35 different FBI investigations, and the thefts ran from 81 cents to over $580,000 in one transfer. He had hundreds of thousands of dollars in credit card debt, loans and car payments, and paid off several large loans.

The Justice Department said his misuse of the credentials "compromised multiple FBI investigations related to both criminal groups and nation state adversaries," and exposed the bureau's investigations to the targets who controlled the wallets, compromising sources and methods.

Yaroch confessed to a DOJ employee in July, saying he was frustrated he could not do more to disrupt one suspect's use of cryptocurrency. He is due to be sentenced in March.

For defenders, the case is a reminder that wallet access controls are only as good as the people holding them. The reporting doesn't say what auditing existed over those systems or when the transfers were noticed.