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Police from around the world shut down the biggest active black market on the dark web this month, according to announcements from law enforcement agencies in the United States, Germany, and the Netherlands released on Friday.
Wall Street Market, as the black market site was known, was the target of a 1.5-year-long multinational investigation. Three Germans were arrested on April 23 and 24 inside Germany for their alleged role in creating and administering the site that sold illegal drugs, documents, weapons, and data.
"WSM was one of the largest and most voluminous darknet marketplaces of all time," FBI Special Agent Leroy Shelton wrote in the criminal complaint released on Friday.
Source: https://gizmodo.com/one-of-the-largest-dark-net-markets-of-all-time-falls-1834511568
(Score: 5, Informative) by sshelton76 on Monday May 06 2019, @03:50PM (2 children)
Not mentioned is that owners exit scammed awhile ago and the reason the feds were able to take this place down is that one of the admins intentionally leaked the credentials for the site to a public forum.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/law-enforcement-seizes-dark-web-market-after-moderator-leaks-backend-credentials/ [zdnet.com]
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Tuesday May 07 2019, @02:39PM
I can't tell if there is no honor among thieves, or hell hath no fury like an admin scorned, or something like that.
It sounds more like the theivery was overlapping with other thievery and the most enterprising thief made sure he got away with the largest cut he could after he shook down numerous entities. His leak pretty much let the authorities hone in on other people. I am sure he cleaned his tracks prior to playing out his last act of "site moderation".
The article doesn't say if he was part of the people apprehended or if the loot is recoverable from him. Whoever the guy Patrick is that they have the tweet from essentially admits in his tweet that he's got administrative capabilities or knows someone who did, and that the mod posted his own password and left. At that point it was probably too late for him anyway, but it is sure curious op-sec to post with real name and photo like that unless the picture and the name were fakes as well.
Usually someone expressing such concerns with such detail aren't from outside the community yet with inside knowledge, so it's pretty strange to me what he said and posted. Or perhaps he was in denial anything bad could possibly happen because all he has to do is change the password and apologize to people for the inconveniences.
(Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Tuesday May 07 2019, @04:09PM
One wonders how they made arrests, then, the story doesn't specify the roles of the people they nabbed. Assuming they weren't the top admins then the headline could read, "Admins escape with 11 million and aren't likely to be caught now."
So, now that this head of the Hydra is chopped off which is the next one rising to take its place?
This sig for rent.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday May 06 2019, @04:01PM (3 children)
Somebody's doing it wrong...
Is it wise to put up a great big store front on the "Dark Net"?
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday May 06 2019, @05:14PM (1 child)
Yeah, right, 'cause the mob boss wants a non-centralized administration.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday May 06 2019, @05:34PM
Probably better for the buttonmen not to have their names in the boss's email server...
Anyway, these guys only got caught because of a snitch. Betrayal is big business. Payouts are pretty good.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Monday May 06 2019, @08:31PM
Fronts for illegal activities are as old as the activities themselves. Next time they do it, I hope they make it an ice cream store.
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Monday May 06 2019, @04:04PM (10 children)
That's not crazy expensive as support requests go actually if you just think of it that way. Of course a few days later those people are burned anyway, so there is that.
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @04:34PM (9 children)
Blame it on capitalism running amok. No respect for traditions, no longer a Thieves Guild to keep the rules and arbitrate disputes, not even a union to represent the petty thieves.
All monopolized by banksters, multi-nationals and lobby groups. And politicians.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday May 06 2019, @05:26PM (6 children)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't 'Thief' one of the oldest professions? It has to rank right up there with prostitution. Capitalism is a comparatively new phenomena.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday May 06 2019, @05:37PM
Capitalism is merely a new name for a phenomenon that goes all the way back to the first signs of life, if not the Big Bang. Trade is ubiquitous.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @05:41PM (2 children)
That would be a full time job.
You make it so easy it's like shooting fish in a barrel.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @05:54PM (1 child)
So says the nameless fool who contributes nothing to the conversation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @07:37PM
So, are you Pot or Kettle?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @06:38PM (1 child)
Everyone knows the oldest profession - prostitute.
However, the contenders for SECOND oldest profession are:
"Joshua son of Nun sent two spies out from Shittim secretly with orders to reconnoitre the country. The two men came to Jericho and went to the house of a prostitute named Rahab..."
- Spying
- Politics (the people that ordered the spies)
- Motherhood (because of the oldest profession)
- Funeral arranger (because of the prostitution and spies)
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Tuesday May 07 2019, @01:33AM
You're only going back as far as city states. Go farther and I bet the whole thief thing rises to the top. It isn't that much different to take stuff from nature that you need or want, than it is to take stuff from people who took stuff from nature.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday May 06 2019, @08:58PM
> Blame it on capitalism running amok. No respect for traditions, no longer a Thieves Guild
> to keep the rules and arbitrate disputes, not even a union to represent the petty thieves.
Maybe the gig got too big and they ran out of receipts ?
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Tuesday May 07 2019, @12:54AM
Yes there is, it's not always in session, but it's still there.
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 2) by The Shire on Monday May 06 2019, @04:40PM (2 children)
By its very nature they can't know the size of any particular darknet. This is pure hyperbole.
(Score: 2) by progo on Monday May 06 2019, @05:13PM (1 child)
I think they're making that determination by the value of transactions in a typical month. The cops had admin access to the marketplace site.
(Score: 3, Informative) by The Shire on Tuesday May 07 2019, @04:53PM
They don't have access to any other darknet market is my point, so any comparison is pointless. The whole idea behind a darknet is that its not something the authorities have a good handle on. And as was pointed out, this particular market was already shutdown long before the cops arrived. It was basically the carcass of an abandonded market.
I stand by my claim that this is just hyperbole - it's a bunch of cops patting themselves on the back for "uncovering" something that was given to them by an insider and shutting down something that wasn't even running anymore.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @06:26PM (3 children)
This site attracted rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass-kickers, shit-kickers and Methodists.
(Score: 3, Funny) by sshelton76 on Monday May 06 2019, @07:39PM (1 child)
Reminds me of the time my wife and I drove by an Evangelical Free Church for the first time and my wife without missing a beat asks...
"So how do you think they got rid of all the Evangelicals?"
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday May 06 2019, @08:09PM
Antiretroviral drugs. Those guys only have one helix, so~o...
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 07 2019, @01:44AM
I'll stick with rape, murder, arson and rape.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Monday May 06 2019, @07:59PM (2 children)
So have the replacement "largest" Dark Web drug bazaar opened yet? After all isn't this just dark digital whack-a-mole? One gets put down and another pops up cause drug dealers wanna push their wares and drug users want to order drugs from the comfort of their home.
That said the trend tends to be that these all end in scamming just as if it was a bitcoin-exchange. Sooner or later someone in charge is going to think that the escrow wallet is just to large and tempting not to grab and run. After all millions of bucks in bitcoin just sitting there in one tiny little file waiting for you ...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @09:11PM
After all, that's why we keep our fundraising so low around here. A few thousand just isn't worth the effort ...
(Score: 3, Touché) by realDonaldTrump on Tuesday May 07 2019, @06:13AM
Facebook, possibly is the next Wall Street Market. 2.3 billion "people" on that one!!