A Tennessee man who ran an Instagram account called @ihackedthegovernment has been sentenced after pleading guilty to doing exactly what the name suggests. Nicholas Moore, from Springfield, broke into some of the most sensitive computer systems in the United States, then posted the evidence for anyone to see.
Moore’s targets included the US Supreme Court’s electronic document filing system, AmeriCorps, and the Department of Veterans Affairs health platform, according to reporting by TechCrunch. He used stolen login credentials to get inside each of these systems, then published personal data belonging to the real account holders on his public Instagram page.
The hacks took place between August and October 2023. Court records show Moore accessed the Supreme Court’s filing system on 25 separate days during that stretch, sometimes going back multiple times in a single day. Through that access, he pulled a victim’s full name, email address, phone number, home address, date of birth, and answers to three security questions.
He posted a veteran’s blood type and medications online
One of the more disturbing details involves a retired US Marine. Moore used that veteran’s stolen VA credentials to log into the My HealtheVet platform on five separate days. He then sent a screenshot to an associate showing the veteran’s prescription list, and later posted the man’s full name, home address, phone number, blood type, and service branch to his public Instagram account.
A separate AmeriCorps victim had their name, date of birth, home address, citizenship status, Social Security number’s last four digits, and service history exposed on the same account. None of the victims gave Moore permission to access their accounts, and court records do not explain how he obtained their login information in the first place.
Moore was not the only person using a suspicious life hack to make waves online, but his particular brand of oversharing had far more serious consequences.
‘I made a mistake,’ Moore tells the judge
Moore pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of computer fraud. He faced up to a year in prison and a potential fine of $100,000, but prosecutors ultimately did not push for jail time. At his sentencing hearing on April 17, Moore addressed the court directly.
“I made a mistake,” he said, per The Hill. “I am truly sorry. I respect laws, and I want to be a good citizen.”
The judge sentenced him to one year of probation. The government had initially requested 36 months of probation, but did not ask for incarceration or a financial penalty. Moore’s Instagram account, @ihackedthegovernment, no longer appears on the platform.
The case drew immediate comparisons to the kind of media-savvy but self-destructive behavior that has become something of a pattern online. It also raised fresh questions about how easily restricted government systems can be accessed with stolen credentials, and what kind of deterrent a misdemeanor charge actually provides. A media outlet that tried something similar by suppressing a major story found that the public exposure was just as damaging as the act itself.
Moore’s case is now closed. He walked out of federal court in Washington, DC, a free man, on probation, with a guilty plea on his record for hacking three branches and agencies of the United States government.
