If you’re a regular user of Darknet Markets, you might have noticed that many of them are currently down. This has left many users wondering what’s going on and if they’ll ever be able to access their favorite markets again.
Categorizing Counterfeits
Following a year where the market’s admin caught the Coronavirus and some of the market’s servers were seized by authorities, it’s only natural that the admin may have realized that it may be time to retire. Like millions of individuals around the world, the pandemic put a pause to the admin’s day-to-day activities, causing him to announce his unavailability for some time while he took some personal leave to recover. Going out of business is a popular phenomenon with online marketplaces both in the Dark Net and surface web. Dark Net marketplaces continually shut down for a number of reasons, causing those markets’ users to actively search for alternative spots to trade goods and services.
Reasons for the Outages
There are several reasons why Darknet Markets might be down. Here are some of the most common ones:
Crypto Crime Mid-year Update: Crime Down 65%, 33 Crypto Myths Busted, And More!
Law Enforcement Action
Law enforcement agencies around the world are constantly working to shut down Darknet Markets. They use a variety of tactics, including undercover operations, sting operations, and hacking to take down these sites. When a market is taken down, it can take days or even weeks for it to come back online, if it comes back at all.
- Common uses include non-indexed webpages for online banking, web email, and paywall-protected content.
- Since the classifier received additional information from the product description, which was not available to the annotators, it is possible that mismatches between the annotations and product descriptions led to more misclassifications in the category “Other”.
- For example, some custom orders might have similar descriptions as other counterfeits.
- In some instances, vendors listed the variations of the products in separate listings and later merged them into a single listing with the option of making the wanted changes (color, amount, etc.) or vice versa.
- The program is part of the Priority Criminal Justice Needs Initiative of NIJ in partnership with RAND, PERF, RTI International, and the University of Denver.
- Similar trends were also observed when the famous Empire Market left the underground ecosystem in an apparent exit scam.
Technical Issues
Why Does The Dark Web Exist?
Darknet Markets are complex sites that require a lot of technical expertise to run. From time to time, they can experience technical issues that cause them to go down. These issues can be caused by anything from a simple server crash to a more serious problem with the site’s infrastructure.
Is AlphaBay still online?
After it was shut down in July 2017 following law enforcement action in the United States, Canada, and Thailand as part of Operation Bayonet, it was relaunched in August 2021 by the self-described co-founder and security administrator DeSnake.
Exit Scams
You can use trusted dark web search engines to find some helpful dark websites. You can also find secure email services, independent journalism platforms, and even the dark web Wiki. The examples listed above are just a few of the many instances where cybercriminals are observed acting just as regular marketers looking to improve their profits and market traffic. What is evident is that these markets’ admins show a trend of offering free vendor bonds to try and lure new sellers to come to their marketplaces following their competitor’s closure. Overall, the carding landscape is much bigger than the several markets we mentioned in this post. Moreover, cybercriminals buy cards and dumps not only in specialized shops but also on forums, via instant messaging channels, and behind closed doors in private deals.
An exit scam is when the operators of a Darknet Market suddenly disappear, taking all of the site’s funds with them. This is a common occurrence in the world of Darknet Markets, and it can leave users high and dry, with no way to access their funds or the market itself.
What Can Users Do?
If you’re a user of Darknet Markets, there are a few things you can do to protect yourself and your funds:
- Use a reputable market with a good track record.
- Always use a VPN to protect your identity.
- Never store large amounts of funds on a market.
- Keep an eye on the news and be prepared for outages.
The Treasury states that known Garantex transactions show over $100 million connected with illicit actors and darknet markets. These transactions include nearly $6 million from the Russian Ransomware-as-a-Service gang Conti and about $2.6 million from Hydra. “Together with our German law enforcement partners, we have seized the infrastructure of the world’s largest darknet market, but our work is far from over,” U.S. The emergence of Telegram as a new dark web frontier also partly explains the revenue reductions in traditional dark web marketplaces. Threat actors and aspiring cybercriminals have been flocking to Telegram channels and groups hoping to benefit from even better anonymity and default end-to-end encryption.
Dark web sites are accessible only through special browsers like The Onion Router (Tor). Tor conceals user locations and IP addresses, wrapping them in layers of encryption, allowing for the anonymity necessary to host the illegal activities that take place on the dark web. If the IP address of a Dream Market server was accidentally exposed, the site operators and customers may no longer be anonymous. In July of 2017, a global law enforcement sting known as Operation Bayonet took down AlphaBay’s sprawling narcotics-and-cybercrime bazaar, seizing the site’s central server in Lithuania and arresting its creator, Alexandre Cazes, outside his home in Bangkok.
What was the first black market website?
Silk Road was an online black market and the first modern darknet market. It was launched in 2011 by its American founder Ross Ulbricht under the pseudonym "Dread Pirate Roberts".
“They’re either the dumbest exit scammers I know of, or it was not an exit scam at all.” Nonetheless, in an interview published today with a cryptomarket researcher that goes by the nickname of 2CTFM, the same low-level admin who announced the hack said the market never stored that many funds and the admins couldn’t have taken more than $20,000. “Sounds like Bitcoin [price] got high enough and they wanted to get paid,” one Reddit user pointed out yesterday.
By following these simple steps, you can minimize your risk and ensure that you’re able to access your favorite markets when they come back online.
Conclusion
Darknet Markets can be a great way to access products and services that are otherwise difficult to obtain. However, they can also be risky, and it’s important to be prepared for outages and other issues. By understanding why Darknet Markets might be down and taking steps to protect yourself, you can ensure that you’re able to access the products and services you need, even when the markets are down.
What is the most valuable data on the dark web?
It's no secret that healthcare is the industry most plagued by data breaches. Patient data is the most valuable, making it targeted by bad actors. Reports show the value of a health record can be worth as much as $1,000, whereas on the dark web, a credit card number is worth $5 and Social Security numbers are worth $1.
