How a Stranger Used One Text Message to Steal My Entire Digital Life

Standing right there at the Genius Bar, I made my first call for help, to a friend who works in private security. That was the person who told me, in plain and practical terms, how to start locking everything down, and much of what my wife and I did over the next several days came from that first call.

I left the store and went to my cousin’s house. Neither of us had the first idea where to begin unwinding this, and we sat there together, two grown men, feeling helpless.

It was no longer only about money, though the money went that night too. The person who held my account also held more than 100,000 family photographs, my notes, my data, every password saved in my Apple keychain, my entire iMessage history, and, worst of all, the ability to receive the text-message verification codes sent to my own number, the codes that guard everything else.

In one app, the thief sold the investments I held there to raise cash, then reached my wife directly, sending her a payment request that looked to her like it came from me. She was careful and declined the first requests. A later one, appearing to be from me, drew thousands of dollars out of her before she understood that her own husband was not the one asking.