Feds slay dark-web souk Hydra: Servers and $25m in crypto-coins seized US and German federal agencies came down hard on Hydra, the longest-running known dark-web marketplace trafficking in illegal drugs and money-laundering services, with a multi-pronged attack that aimed to cut off multiple heads of the nefarious online beast. First, German federal police in coordination with US law enforcement …
I've always wondered what happens to the seized crypto in operations such as this. At least weekly you hear "Crooks get done, $x million/billion in crypto seized" or similar.
So where does it go? Restitution/returned to "victims"? Stored for infinity in some fed-held wallet as it's not a recognised asset in whatever jurisdiction it is? 80% gets forgotten about and the remaining 20% gets declared in the press release as a successful bust?
Icon for effect.
It's crazy that people run DNM sites on servers that aren't encrypted, allowing wallets to be seized, or have no backups so they can quickly wash the entire balance into another wallet. Like.. it's 2022.. full disk encryption is a thing... DNM's being raided and seized is a thing... do they literally have so much money they just don't care if $25 million gets stolen?
Somebody help these people out with their devops. It should be a single-click to generate a .onion domain and deploy the site, then a few seconds to ssh in and unlock the wallet.
What they have so far is:
1. Servers seized, possible source of more evidence.
2. Market is shut down. To move it, the admins will have to generate a new address and migrate users, and some users won't switch because it could always be an operation by law enforcement to find them.
3. If the summary is correct, some cryptocurrency previously controlled by the operators is now unavailable to them.
4. One person connected to it has been publicly identified. He's probably not going to court, but he would prefer to have remained anonymous.
I think that's probably right, but knowing that regime change is needed to end a serious crisis and mustering the power and resolve to invade a massive country with nuclear weapons are two different things. I don't think any country will be willing to use military force to force Putin out, and therefore, if the regime does change, it will be to someone who is already somewhat powerful there. That person is less likely to submit to all the U.S.'s requests.
They break into your house because, being illegal, the s**t is so expensive. Removing the huge profit margins will make your house far less likely to be burglarized (by a drug addict, at least). Trouble is, the ‘war on drugs’ means lots of money for cops also so it’s unlikely this mess will go away anytime soon.
Fair.
Just keep them away from any dangerous machinery like cars, motorbikes, guns etc. Let employer fire them if they are unable to perform their tasks or are dangerous to others while performing them - and of course no subsidies should be paid by others to maintain them - it's their decision to get those drugs.
And of course if they cause harm to others while under the influence of drugs punish them very, very severely - they have no right to harm others and doing it while under drugs freely taken should be a big, big aggravating factor.
There's no freedom without accountability and responsibility.
Wise words, well spoken, but as you can see, the majority of people do indeed think they have the right to tell other people how to live their lives and have therefore down-voted you. :(
You can't get rid of "evils" in society by making them illegal. All it does is push the market underground to dangerous conditions and great expense for the users or addicts that leads to street crime to fund their wants and needs, but at great risk to their health and safety.
Prohibition is a lose-lose proposition for society when you're dealing with behavior that doesn't directly cause harm to others. Although I believe in the rule of law, I believe in the right to live one's life how one chooses within the restrictions of reasonable laws, not those based on judgemental busybodies trying to mold society into their particular vision at the expense of others.
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