UK man tied to The Com sentenced for abusing 117 victims

Justin Swaddle, who was a minor when he committed the crimes, coerced children across multiple countries into self-harm and sexual abuse using threats tied to their personal information, authorities said.

A 20-year-old man in the United Kingdom was sentenced to two years in prison Monday after admitting to running an online abuse campaign that affected 117 victims across multiple countries during his time in the loosely organized online criminal network known as The Com.

Justin Swaddle, who was a minor when committed the crimes, pleaded guilty last month to a series of child sexual abuse offenses and blackmail. He was sentenced Monday at the same court and will be required to register as a sex offender.

The National Crime Agency, the U.K.’s lead law enforcement agency, had been investigating Swaddle since January 2024 after local police arrested him in October 2023 on charges of possessing, making and distributing indecent images. Investigators eventually found a broad online presence on Snapchat, Telegram and Discord, where he operated under usernames including “Epstein,” “Rugen” and “Moscow.”

A search of his phone and computer also turned up hundreds of sexually explicit conversations with young females, according to the NCA. Investigators determined Swaddle was part of The Com, a sprawling cybercriminal network of minors and young adults who engage in violence, extortion, sextortion and various forms of cybercrime. 

The NCA identified 117 female victims worldwide between the ages of 13 and 17, eight of them in the United Kingdom. One victim, 17, told investigators she met Swaddle on Discord in November 2022 before their conversations moved to Snapchat. She said Swaddle obtained her name, address and school details, then used that information to pressure her into various acts, threatening to expose her personal information unless she provided further images and videos.

“Justin Swaddle targeted young and vulnerable victims all over the world to abuse and scare them into carrying out shocking self-harm and sexual activity, purely to gain popularity with his peers online,” Danielle Pownall, an operations manager from the NCA, said in a release. “While the number of people involved in Com groups are relatively small, the impact it has on victims is high and long-lasting, as Swaddle’s offending shows.”

Law enforcement in both the U.K. and United States has been extremely active over the past few months in bringing Com-affiliated members to justice. Last week, a Canadian man who was linked with the group pleaded guilty for the widespread compromise of more than 165 Snowflake customer environments. Last month, a pair of young men tied to the Com were sentenced in the U.K. to 66 months in jail for committing a cyberattack on the Transport for London in 2024. 

Government

• FBI officials say AI is bolstering adversaries, emphasizing need to focus on cyber basics, patching

• Feds accuse China of ‘systematic’ distillation of U.S. AI models

• CIA’s Michael Ellis says cyber intelligence is changing how the agency operates

• The G7 tells industry to hurry up and prep for post-quantum encryption

Technology

• European parliament members call for slowdown of Serbia’s EU entry over spyware use

• FCC proposes public scorecard to rate telecoms on anti-robocall efforts

• Pegasus, NoviSpy variant spyware found on devices of Serbian activists

• Wyden seeks upgraded NSA security guidance on commercial VPN use

Threats

• Microsoft discloses two actively exploited zero-days among 974 vulnerabilities

• Russian national extradited to US for alleged involvement in bank-account takeover scheme

• Attackers exploit zero-days in consistently besieged SonicWall product

• Dogged Russia-based botnet dismantled after 23-year run

Policy

• Whistleblower says USPS deploying new, ‘untested’ IT systems governing mail-in ballots

• ‘Watershed 250’ test program in Texas looks to private sector for water cybersecurity help

• Former sexual abuse victims say Grok used their images, videos to train deepfake capabilities

• Cyber threats nudge Trump to sign executive order on foreign equipment in U.S. energy infrastructure