The investigation outlined in the complaint affidavit linked the three defendants to WSM in a number of ways, including their access to the WSM computer infrastructure. One defendant, for example, used virtual private networks to access WSM computers, but when a VPN connection would fail, his IP was revealed and authorities were able to identify his specific location. This is only the latest in a string of hits by German authorities against underground web operators. Earlier this month, German police seized the illegal online trading platform Crimemarket and arrested three people believed to be involved in the operation. Operation Deep Sentinel is the latest international law enforcement collaboration against cybercrime, shutting down Archetyp – one of the largest dark web drug marketplaces.
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According to the indictment, vendors on Hydra could create accounts on the site to advertise their illegal products, and buyers could create accounts to view and purchase the vendors’ products. Hydra vendors offered a variety of illicit drugs for sale, including cocaine, methamphetamine, LSD, heroin and other opioids. The vendors openly advertised their drugs on Hydra, typically including photographs and a description of the controlled substance. Buyers rated the sellers and their products on a five-star rating system, and the vendors’ ratings and reviews were prominently displayed on the Hydra site.
The term “packaging” refers to the manner in which the drug is packaged in order to evade detection by sniffer dogs or other methods of locating odors and traces. As a deterrent for dishonest users, the operator of the website keeps the money in a secure location. The actual shipping of the goods through the postal system is the only link in the chain that could potentially be compromised–though that is changing of late.
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German authorities said Hydra Market’s “Bitcoin Bank Mixer” service, which obfuscates cryptocurrency transactions, was also disrupted in the raid. The cryptocurrency laundering angle will be of particular interest to threat analysts and enterprise network defenders. “The preliminary investigation pending at the ZIT in this regard is directed against the previously unknown operators and administrators of the platform mentioned,” read a translation of the German announcement.
That spurred investigators to act, and on 23 and 24 April they arrested the three German suspects, aged 22 to 31, in the states of Baden-Württemberg, Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia. In addition to the seizure, one person connected to the running of Kingdom Market has been charged in the U.S. with identity theft and money laundering. Alan Bill, who also goes by the aliases Vend0r and KingdomOfficial, has been described as a Slovakian national. In March, Europol announced that German and Ukrainian police targeted multiple individuals that are allegedly “core members” of the DoppelPaymer ransomware group.
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Altogether €50.8 million in cash and virtual currencies, 850 kg of drugs, and 117 firearms were seized. In addition, 288 suspects were arrested in the USA, UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, France, Switzerland, Poland, and Brazil. Because law enforcement authorities also gained access to the lists of buyers, Monopoly Market customers across the globe are now at risk of prosecution.
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Nemesis was founded in 2021 and has been growing rapidly since then, according to the BKA. “The investigation to bring to justice the administrators of and vendors on Nemesis Market continues,” a spokesperson for the U.S. Payments on the platform were made exclusively with Monero, a privacy-enhanced cryptocurrency the architecture of which makes tracing blockchain transactions much more of a pain for authorities. The marketplace had more than 600,000 users with a total transaction volume of at least €250 million ($289 million). The BKA also said 20 additional properties were searched, mainly targeting Archtetyp moderators and vendors.
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Some dealers will send drugs or contraband concealed within DVD cases, the battery compartments of torches, or even the spines of books in an effort to conceal them. “This was expected by some members of the community,” dark web researcher Patrick Shortis told Newsweek about Wall Street Market. “What they didn’t expect was for Valhalla to be seized too. No one saw that coming. However, that market has gone unused for quite some time.” Since 2015, Hydra Market has received about $5.2 billion in cryptocurrency for transactions on the site, reaping commissions worth millions of dollars on those sales, the DOJ said. Eventually, after five years of investigation, the federal police managed to identify the alleged admin of the third version of DiDW, arresting him on October 25, 2022. BKA’s announcement says investigations into Nemesis Market started in October 2022, involving German, Lithuanian, and American agencies, including the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), and the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI).
