Operational security has increased, with mandatory PGP encryption, two-factor authentication, and more frequent use of VPNs and anonymization tools. As described by IRS Criminal Investigation Chief Guy Ficco, investigators “cracked the code of so-called ‘safe spaces’” by targeting these friction points. Avalyan is charged with one count of distribution of cocaine, one count of distribution of MDMA, and one count of distribution of distribution of methamphetamine. Gevorgyan is charged with one count of possession with intent to distribute MDMA and one count of possession with intent to distribute ketamine. Grigoryan is charged with one count of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine.
German police have arrested a 34-year-old Australian man for his alleged involvement in running DarkMarket a dark web marketplace selling. At the same time, the Italian authorities darknet market arrests have moved against two other dark web markets, DeepSea and Berlusconi, and arrested four people. According to a federal grand jury indictment, Spencer set up accounts on the darknet, an online black market frequently used for anonymous. Australian man arrested in Germany accused of running ‘world’s largest’ Darknet marketplace The alleged operator darknet market arrests of illegal online marketplace. The arrests came after a similar joint operation led by the Germans seized the largest illegal marketplace on the dark web, DarkMarket. In a coordinated effort, law enforcement agencies in six countries, plus Europol, shut down two illicit dark web markets and gathered.
In total, the Dutch police (Politie) and partners in Ireland, the UK, and the US seized over 8 million euros ($8.77M) worth of cryptocurrency from the two administrators. On Monday, Europol announced it had dismantled Archetyp Market, which had been around since 2020, making it one of the “most enduring” dark web drug providers, the agency said. That exit didn’t stop investigators from the Netherlands, Ireland, UK and the USA, leading to two arrests of suspected administrators. Operation Take Back America streamlines efforts and resources from the Department’s Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETFs) and Project Safe Neighborhood (PSN). Still, it’s unclear whether even 150 arrests will be enough to slow things down.
For example, in November 2023, an undercover law enforcement agent received several tablets that purported to be oxycodone, which were purchased on Incognito Market. Testing on those tablets revealed that they were not authentic oxycodone at all and were, in fact, fentanyl pills. Incognito Market was designed to foster seamless narcotics transactions across the internet and across the world and incorporated many features of legitimate e-commerce sites, such as branding, advertising and customer service.
JCODE and Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) continue to compile intelligence packages to identify entities of interest. These leads allow U.S. and international law enforcement agencies to identify darknet drug vendors and buyers, resulting in a series of coordinated, but separate, law enforcement investigations, reflected in the statistics announced today. In furtherance of Operation RapTor and in its first action as a JCODE member agency, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) additionally sanctioned Iranian national Behrouz Parsarad for his role as the founder and operator of Nemesis Market following seizure of the market. Parsarad was also indicted by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of Ohio on drug trafficking charges related to the illegal business he ran on the dark web. Dark Web Drug Busts Lead to 150 Arrests Operation Dark HunTor spanned eight countriesand put the focus on sellers more than marketplaces. Global law enforcement recently arrested 179 individuals tied to DNMs and seized over darknet market arrests million in cryptocurrency and cash proceeds.
Guide To Darknet Markets
The digital drug bazaar had evolved into one of the dark web’s most prominent hubs, boasting over 612,000 users and generating more than €250 million (nearly \$289 million) in illegal cryptocurrency transactions. Known for distributing a vast array of narcotics, including cocaine, heroin, MDMA, amphetamines, and lethal opioids like fentanyl, Archetyp Market served as a massive pipeline for illegal substances across the globe. Building on the successes of prior years’ operations, Operation RapTOR furthered global efforts to dismantle darknet marketplaces, resulting in the seizure of darknet infrastructure from Nemesis, Tor2Door, Bohemia, and Kingdom Markets. These actions provided investigators across the globe with invaluable leads and evidence, strengthening the ongoing fight against cybercrime and illicit activities on the darknet. This is the story of how one of the admins of the darknet marketplace Dream Market was arrested. Seized firearms are seen darknet market arrests on display during a Toronto Police Service press conference to update the public on the results of raids, which took place across the GTA on Thursday, in Toronto on Friday, June 22, 2018.
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However, during the raids, authorities seized the criminal infrastructures of the marketplace, which will provide investigators across the world with leads and evidence to identify more individuals behind dark web accounts. The far-reaching success of Operation RapTor hinged on extensive cooperation between numerous agencies and international partners. In the U.S., crucial support came from the DEA, FBI, IRS-CI, HSI, USPIS, and the FDA OCI. On the international front, Europol and national police forces across ten countries were vital to the effort. The U.S. Department of Justice’s Joint Criminal Opioid and Darknet Enforcement (JCODE) team spearheaded this international initiative, teaming up closely with Europol and numerous law enforcement agencies throughout Europe, Asia, and South America. Officials are calling Operation RapTor the most successful JCODE effort yet, both in terms of the sheer amount of contraband seized and the number of suspects apprehended.
Arrested In Massive Global Dark Web Takedown
- The market’s takedown came after years of effort from Germany, Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Sweden and the United States.
- When the admins “exit scammed” and split the money members had deposited to the platform, the police traced the amounts and identified the administrators.
- Incognito, like other modern darknet platforms, operated entirely on cryptocurrency—primarily Bitcoin and Monero.
- To facilitate these financial transactions, Incognito Market had its own “bank,” which allowed its users to deposit cryptocurrency on the site into their own accounts.
Your donation powers investigations that expose organized crime and corruption worldwide. Coordinated by the EU police agency, the operation involved nine countries, including the United States, seven European nations, and Brazil. The Dutch national police’s Cyber Enabled Crime Team was involved in the operation, codenamed SpecTor. It seized 50.8 million euros ($53.4 million) in cash and virtual currencies, 850 kilograms of drugs, and 117 firearms were seized in a series of raids in several countries.
What Awaits The Users? Buyers In The Crosshairs!
- The platform also featured prescription drug listings falsely marketed as authentic, and some products were outright scams—counterfeit pills advertised as legitimate pharmaceuticals.
- While 155 of the arrests took place in the US, authorities seized $53.4 million in cash and digital currencies, 850kg (or 1,873 lbs) of drugs, and 117 firearms worldwide.
- Monero’s privacy features in particular obscured sender, receiver, and transaction amounts, posing challenges to investigators tracing flows.
- Two Israelis arrested in international dark web takedown involving FBI operated the so-called Wall Street Market darknet platform.
- Operation RapTor resulted in the highest number of seizures of any JCODE operation, including more than $200 million in currency and digital assets, over two metric tons of drugs, 144 kilograms of fentanyl or fentanyl-laced narcotics, and over 180 firearms.
- Last week, two men, both in custody, were charged in federal court in Chicago with operating “Empire Market,” a dark web marketplace that enabled users to buy and sell more than $430 million in illegal goods and services around the world.
IN OCTOBER 2013, Ross Ulbricht was arrested by the FBI and charged with had launched the Silk Road, the first modern dark web market. Justice Department officials announced on Tuesday darknet market arrests the arrests of 150 people and the seizure of more than 30 million in an international. The robot was christened Random Darknet Shopper and its purchases included a Hungarian passport, Ecstasy pills, fake Diesel jeans, a Sprite.
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During the same operation, police officers in Europe, South America, Asia, and the United States also seized more than 2 tonnes of drugs (including amphetamines, cocaine, ketamine, opioids, and cannabis), over €184 million ($207 million) in cash and cryptocurrency, and over 180 firearms. Articles categorized as “left” provide more commentary on societal impacts, such as links between the marketplace and organized crime in Sweden, or focus on harm caused by synthetic opioids. In contrast, “right” sources tend to emphasize law enforcement success and U.S.-European cooperation, highlighting the logistics of the operation rather than the social aftermath. The operation targeted Archetyp Market, a platform with over 600,000 users and transactions totaling at least 250 million euros, underscoring the scale and ongoing challenge of illicit drug sales facilitated by anonymizing technologies. Authorities from multiple countries, including Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the United States, worked together to investigate and take down a major online criminal marketplace, demonstrating the need for cross-border efforts to combat cyber-enabled crime. “It provided us with all the information which led to the identification of those arrested today,” says Europol press officer Claire Georges.
Partnerships
In coordinated raids around the world, more than 200 searches were carried out and about 120 people were arrested, including 24 arrests in and around the British town of Grimsby, UK law enforcement officials said. From June 11 to 13, the agency said, a series of coordinated law enforcement actions targeting the platform’s administrator, moderators, key vendors and technical infrastructure took place across Germany, the Netherlands, Romania, Spain and Sweden. The takedown followed years of investigation into the platform’s infrastructure and operators. Europol and Eurojust played key roles in coordinating efforts and sharing intelligence, leading to a major blow against one of the most active dark web drug markets. The darknet market was a classic escrow marketplace (i.e. users deposited funds into Empire and, only then, were able to make purchases). Empire quickly attracted new vendors and buyers and its reliability and features, coupled with low vendor bonds – that is, the cost of signing up as a vendor – a responsive moderator team, and the familiarity of the interface, turned it into a leader.
The results of Operation Dark HunTor come more than two years after officials took down the Wall Street Market, which was believed to be one. Police forces across the globe arrested 150 suspects in massive sting operation Operation Dark HunTOR targeted buyers and sellers on darknet. Intelligence from the now-defunct online black market site Silk Road, have continued to make arrests related to the now-defunct site. German authorities arrest QLD man accused of running dark web drug was probably the largest marketplace worldwide on the darknet. Dark Web Drug Busts Lead to 150 Arrests Operation Dark HunTor spurdomarket market spanned eight countriesand put the focus on sellers more than marketplaces. The operation came after a similar law enforcement investigation last year led to the takedown of Wall Street Market, a major dark web hub.
It marks the most significant JCODE operation to date, building on years of enforcement actions and marketplace takedowns, including Kingdom Market, Tor2Door, Bohemia, and Nemesis. The alleged administrators of the infamous Bohemia and Cannabia dark web marketplaces have been arrested after apparently shuttering the sites and trying to flee with their earnings. Not all of the arrests appear to trace directly or exclusively back to the DarkMarket takedown; court documents show that in many cases, suspicious packages provided an initial tipoff. And previous seizures like those of Hansa and Wall Street Market are likely still paying dividends for investigators. This also means that Operation Dark HunTor likely isn’t the final word on dark web arrests and that illicit marketplace vendors may have to proceed with a little more caution. ‘This operation led by the German authorities marks the end of a criminal service that enabled the anonymous trade in high volumes of illicit drugs, including cocaine, MDMA, amphetamines, and synthetic opioids’, the statement said.
Just as Incognito built on the playbook of its predecessors, future markets will learn from RapTor. But with blockchain intelligence advancing and global partnerships strengthening, law enforcement is better positioned than ever to detect, disrupt, and dismantle these operations. In an extraordinary twist, Lin had previously worked for Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where he trained law enforcement officials on the very blockchain analytics techniques used to take down platforms like his own. “With this takedown, law enforcement has taken out one of the dark web’s longest-running drug markets, cutting off a major supply line for some of the world’s most dangerous substances,” said Jean-Philippe Lecouffe, Europol’s Deputy Executive Director of Operations, on Monday.
Staying Protected Against Digital Intrusions
All transactions were conducted in cryptocurrency—primarily Bitcoin and Monero—allowing customers and vendors to move funds without using traditional financial rails. Monero’s privacy features in particular obscured sender, receiver, and transaction amounts, posing challenges to investigators tracing flows. The longest-standing dark web drug market worth £200million has been dismantled following a years-long investigation with its alleged mastermind arrested in Barcelona.
