A federal judge cited the uses of aliases as one of the reasons for keeping locked up pending trial a Palm Coast teenager, who sometimes went by “King Bob” and is accused of wire fraud in a cryptocurrency theft scheme.

Noah Michael Urban, 19, was indicted on eight counts of wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and five counts of aggravated identity theft. He has pleaded not guilty.

Urban was part of a scheme that resulted in the theft of at least $800,000 from at least five different victims between August 2022 and March 2023, according to the indictment.

Besides “King Bob,” Urban also used the aliases “Sosa,” “Elijah” and “Anthony Ramirez.”

Urban was arrested Jan. 9 and his trial is scheduled to begin in the trial term starting March 4 in Jacksonville. A detention hearing took place Jan. 19 in Jacksonville when a judge ordered Urban held pending his trial.

According to an order, Federal Magistrate Judge Joel B. Toomey cited the following reasons for keeping Urban locked up pending his trial:

• Urban had no fixed address and was using an alias to stay at an Airbnb.
• When a search warrant was executed at Urban’s residence, he was downloading programs to delete computer files.
• Urban told pretrial services that he could not remember if he traveled outside the United States. At least some of his accused co-conspirators are in foreign countries.
• Despite telling authorities in May that he would not have any more contact with his co-conspirators and would not engage in cryptocurrency transactions he did so anyway.
• Urban declined to answer detailed questions about his financial situation.
• While he has never been employed, Urban appears self-supporting.
• Urban was unable to provide a urine sample.
• The weight of the evidence against him was strong.
• If convicted he was subject to a long incarceration.
• A preponderance of the evidence indicates no conditions on his release will reasonably assure his appearance.

The cryptocurrency conspiracy

Urban and other conspirators unlawfully obtained victims’ personal identifying information and used it to fraudulently access their virtual currency addresses, according to the indictment.

Using a SIM swap, the conspirators reset the victims’ passwords and verified ownership of the victims’ cellphone numbers by one-time passwords. A SIM swap is a type of fraud in which conspirators take over a person’s cellphone account so that the victim’s incoming messages and texts are sent to a different phone. Once the SIM is swapped, the person can access the victim’s accounts, including those that use two-factor authentication.

Once they accessed the victims’ phones, Urban and other conspirators unlawfully transferred the victims’ cryptocurrency to cryptocurrency wallets controlled by the defendants, according to the indictment.