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Insider Trader Arrested After He Googled 'Insider Trading,' Authorities Allege
Spy Handler writes: Fei Yan, a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and 31-year-old Chinese citizen, was arrested by federal authorities on Wednesday on insider trading charges. Mr. Yan used Google to search for phrases such as "how sec detect unusual trade" and "insider trading with international account." He also allegedly read an article titled "Want to Commit Insider Trading? Here's How Not to Do It," according to the U.S. attorney prosecuting the case. Further reading: Associated Press, CNBC, USA Today
Fuck. I just got arrested for clicking on this story.
RTFA he made bank on 2 mergers last year that is wifes firm was involved in . Thats sketchy as hell. Add the searches to that and you have probable cause to do some major digging.
Well you know if you read the book and made a bomb and blew up the neighbors mailvox with it, you'd probably get in trouble for it. Just like how this guy looked up how to cover up insider trading and went ahead and made 2 insider trades that he profited from.
I swear the /. commenters get dumber each day.
Why did Google report the searches to the SEC? Did he short their stock or something? ;-)
Google didn't report it, they found that he did those searches after they were already looking at him, at least that is what the article implies since it is scant on details. My question though is how they know about the searches? Was it forensics on his computer, or did they get the search history from Google? I'm betting the former.
He did trades on two different companies that were acquired. And presumably that's the only trades that account has done. And both were immediately very profitable. These are then flag as suspicious by SEC data analysis.
The only connection they can find between the two is that the same law firm handled the acquisitions. They then find that the account is owned by a family member of someone at the law firm. They now have probably cause to issue warrants and get the search results?
Ie. the search results are what are flagged him, not his wife, but the fact that insider trading was going on was discovered long before the search results.
My impression of how it went anyway.
Data analysis came up that investments made by some lady who lives in China were weird. Checking the phone calls to the brokerage company found they were coming from his phone. From there they found them being mother and son and then he was married to a lawyer involved in the legal work. Then they subpoenaed his searches from yahoo and google.
We need a new dilbert cartoon. The creator can fuck off though.
After flagging the trades as suspicious through data analysis, the SEC traced them back to Yan.
The SEC was already on his trail by the time they found out about his search history.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
If so then clearly you have nothing to worry about.
I'll read the fine article as a nice break from my assignment on file system design.
I'll just close this tab on "Everything Hans Reiser Did Wrong and What to Avoid"
Recycle PCs and build a wireless community network www.hillsborough.org.nz
He was also arrested after eating breakfast.
Because he was a cereal killer?
I've also read quite a bit about nuclear and biological weapons...
If you read that and then promptly created some biological weapons, it definitely DOES prove intent.