World’s largest dark-web marketplace shuttered after Euro cybercops cuff Aussie

Europol cops have taken down dark-web souk DarkMarket, after arresting an Australian citizen living in Germany who they claim was operating the world's biggest online bazaar of its kind. DarkMarket had nearly 500,000 users and more than 2,400 sellers, an official announcement from Europol on Tuesday said, calling it the “world …

[ecofeco]

Excellent news

See title.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Excellent news

And without government mandated backdoors.

[Mike 137]

Continued co-operation assured?

"...in addition to Germany[...]), Australia [...]), Denmark[...]), Moldova and Ukraine, the UK’s National Crime Agency and the US’ DEA, FBI and IRS were also involved. That level of international cooperation is essential in tackling online marketplaces..."

Clearly the majority if not all of this co-operation happened before January 1st. We can only hope that Europol will continue to work with the UK now we're a "third country".

BTW, does that imply 'part of the Third World'?

[codejunky]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

@Mike 137

"BTW, does that imply 'part of the Third World'?"

No just as the whole of the EU is not first world

[PTW]

Re: Third World.

Neither Allies, nor Axis. So quite literally, impossible for the UK to be Third World.

[Flexdream]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

He's an Australian living in Germany. Australia isn't in the EU. Co-operation against crime will continue regardless whether the UK is in the EU or out.

[Cuddles]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

"We can only hope that Europol will continue to work with the UK now we're a "third country"."

Of the seven countries named in your quote, two are members of the EU. It seems a little dishonest to conclude that Europol might therefore have a problem working with the UK.

[Rol]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

Our future relationship with America, could prove a stumbling block. There is the potential that the UK will redraft some legislation for the sake of smoothing things with our Atlantic cousins, and that might conflict with the assurances required by Interpol about the sharing of intelligence.

[Halfmad]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

Potential we won't too.

[Rol]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

Fingers crossed then.

[Cuddles]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

Once again, look at the list of countries actually involved in this investigation. Europol already shares intelligence and conducts joint operations with the USA directly. It's just sheer nonsense to suggest that the UK could therefore have a problem just because it might start making deals with the USA.

[Muppet Boss]

Re: Continued co-operation assured?

>Clearly the majority if not all of this co-operation happened before January 1st. We can only hope that Europol will continue to work with the UK now we're a "third country".

They worked with Ukraine and enjoyed UK rain...

[NonSSL-Login]

Blip in the Matrix

I assume a take-down means a temporary void before the sellers and buyers move to another site and start building reputation again as if nothing happened.

The cops get the server so can maybe link bitcoin addresses to accounts, of which most of the sellers would not be on an exchange so not immediately identifiable.

Communication for sales on such sites usually use PGP so they will get a lot of encrypted messages and mostly metadata, which we all know can be useful.

Overall with all the money spent for what is gained on these big operations, I wonder if its always worth it or its just keeping people in jobs.

[a_yank_lurker]

Re: Blip in the Matrix

As long as some items are illegal to readily sell to the public there will always be a black market. There will always be a whack-a-mole aspect to the plod's efforts as there are many who are willing to try make money in black market.

The only real solution is to rationalize the laws to move products from the black market to the regular retail markets. But there are too many vested interests in many cases for this to happen.

[MDMAok]

As a stoner of fifty years practice, and therefore old enough not to go out in these troubled times, I have had to master the dNet markets rather than pop down to Railton Road to score.

Excellent service, quality, and so far, reliability. I lost £10 in my escrow when one of them was exit scammed, but recently left £30 by mistake in escrow just before Bitcoin tripled in value, so I smoke for free for six months.

The huge number of markets on the dNet all have very similar software, which would seem obvious for a world where IP rights are challenging to enforce. The escrow provisions, use of encryption, etc are all first class. Easier to get a next day delivery that Tesco.

Closing down one of them is, of course, utterly pointless. Children going hungry and the police are chasing dope dealers rather than Conservative politicians…….where’s ma skins.

[JDPower]

“world’s largest largest illegal marketplace on the dark web.”

Bigly Bigly!

[Anonymous Coward]

Public Safety........or Not????

Quote: "...the cops have been building international coalitions..."

*

In the UK, "the cops" are paying NO ATTENTION to rules about the COVID pandemic.

*

In the USA, "the cops" are paying NO ATTENTION to rioters destroying the Capitol building.

*

In fact, in the USA, "the cops" were notable in the forefront of the rioters destroying the Capitol building (off duty of course).

*

So....am I the only person in the universe who is TERRIFIED of "international coalitions" comprising "the cops"????????

*

Just saying!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

love how you lump the thousand of people that were peaceful with the less than .1% that were criminal.

What political party are you part of so we can lump you in with the worst of them?

FYI - cops are people, not robots. There are good and bad people in every job. You just see the ones that make the news. The worst of them own the ne..

[Bitbeisser]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

>love how you lump the thousand of people that were peaceful with the less than .1% that were criminal.

Sorry, but each and every person that broke through the perimeter of the Capitol has committed felony trespassing. And there were a few thousands of those.

The fact that a lot of those sheeple were being used (what else is new) by people in the background to provide a smokescreen to distract from their ulterior motives doesn't make them "good people". That is exactly the rhetoric that is causing all this mess...

[Version 1.0]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

Public Safety depends on where you live - in the USA it's perfectly OK to walk around most states with a loaded rifle over your shoulder and in a lot of places it's OK to light up a spliff or two ... unless you walk over the border to the next state where you will be jailed for ten years or more if you are lucky (and white).

So what's "right" or "wrong"? It depends on where you live and what colour you are.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

:(.....

in the last 20 years I've seen maybe 2 people make racist comment in person. On the web in social media and forums like this, bamm, comments like yours every day - that try to keep it going.

Real racism in the US died a long long time ago (because 98% of us are immigrants), now we just have assholes that try and get on peoples nerves and use racist comment to do it.

I think the "excuse to hate" has shifted from race to religion, and is floating on political trash right now. I don't like it, but haters are gonna hate, and I'm gona keep calling it out.

[jtaylor]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

Racism is alive and in rude health in much of the US. In some places, it's an overt part of daily life.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Public Safety........or Not????

That's to bad, glad I don't live those places.

Like I said though, the only time I see people pulling racism is as excuse to be mean to people.

The people that do that crap, will use color, religion, political association, sports teams, nationality, sexual orientation. Any excuse to hurt others.

People with that hate, it's so sad they carry it around. but I really believe its more these people want to be mean to people, than any true belief in superiority (clearly if you hate people for petty reasons, you are not superior at all).

But in reality - I nor anyone else knows anyone else's true thoughts and feelings other than my own. So, that, yeah, never mind, I shouldn't give people the benefit of the doubt, maybe that many people really are evil.