The dark web's largest illegal marketplace, DarkMarket, has been shut down after a 10-month investigation. It has resulted in the arrested of 150 suspected buyers and drug vendors.
Dark Web's Illegal Marketplace Closure
DarkMarket was shut down earlier this year as part of an international operation. According to Europol, the European Union's law enforcement agency, the marketplace boasted 500,000 users and facilitated more than 320,000 transactions.
The said marketplace had clientele buying and selling everything from stolen credit card information, malware, drugs, and illegal weapons, according to The Verge.
When authorities from Germany arrested the marketplace's alleged operator back in January, they also seized valuable evidence of transactions, which led to the arrest of key players this week.
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According to Europol and the US Department of Justice, Operation Dark HunTor saw law enforcement make several arrests in different countries.
Law enforcement arrested 65 people in the United States, 47 people in Germany, 24 people in the United Kingdom, four people in Italy, four people in the Netherlands, four people in France, two people in Switzerland, and one in Bulgaria.
Around $31.6 million worth of cash and cryptocurrencies were seized during the operation. The authorities also seized 45 illegal firearms and 234 kilograms of drugs, according to France24.
The drugs that the authorities seized included cocaine, amphetamine, opioids, fentanyl, and MDMA. According to the Department of Justice, a number of investigations are still ongoing.
As part of the operation, Italian authorities also shut down two other dark web illegal marketplaces, the Berlusconi and DeepSea, and arrested four alleged administrators, and seized $4.17 million in cryptocurrency.
The dark web was considered a safe space for buying and selling illegal drugs in the past. Federal agents even believed that COVID-19 vaccines were illegally distributed in the dark web.
However, international operations like Dark HunTor have been arresting suspects regularly and have shut down several marketplaces.
The list of dark web markets closed by federal agents in the past few years is extensive, according to NBC News.
The markets that were shut down included WallStreet, Dream, DeepSea, White House, and DarkMarket.
Although law enforcement has to do an intensive investigation to close the said sites, with new markets being created as soon as the famous ones get shut down, doing so makes it more difficult for buyers and sellers to build a steady online business.
Europol's Deputy Executive Director of Operations, Jean-Philippe Lecoufee, said that the point of operations is to put criminals operating on the dark web on notice.
Law enforcement has the means and partnership to arrest them and charge them for their illegal activities, even in the areas of the dark web.
The Downfall of the Dark Web
In 2017, federal agents had shut down the Alphabay marketplace. It was one of the largest sources of drugs on the dark web.
Even after a year since the shutdown, federal agents were still making arrests connected to Alphabay, chasing down dealers who sold drugs through the marketplace.
Federal agents also had to investigate dark web hackers who leaked the personal information of gun owners online.
Those types of cases grew more common across the board. Even before the takedown, federal agents were able to arrest individual vendors through buy-bust operations.
That technique only grew more effective as the sketchier bitcoin exchanges got shut down and agencies were able to prepare phony money-laundering operations in their place, creating more leads.
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Written by Sophie Webster
