Slashdot Mirror
The Dark Web Still Thrives After Silk Road
HughPickens.com writes: Russell Berman writes at The Atlantic that the government may have won its case against Silk Road's Ross Ulbricht, but the high-profile trial gave a lot of publicity to the dark web. Both the number of sites and the volume of people using them have increased since Silk Road was shuttered. "Just as on the rest of the internet, users on the dark net are very quick to move on to new things and move away from those products and websites that seem stale and old," says Adam Benson. The cat-and-mouse game between users of the dark web and law enforcement appears to be shifting as well. Newer dark sites (two major ones are Agora and Evolution) are likely to protect their servers by basing them in countries "hostile to U.S. law enforcement," says Nicholas Weaver. "The markets will keep moving overseas, but law enforcement will keep going after the dealers," Weaver says, referring to the people who actually ship and deliver the drugs sold online.
Evolution Marketplace is a much different animal than Silk Road, according to Dan Palumbo. Evolution sells "weapons, stolen credit cards, and more nefarious items that were forbidden on both versions of Silk Road. Silk Road sold a lot of dangerous things, but operators drew the line at their version of 'victimless crimes,' i.e. no child pornography, weapons, or identity theft. Now, four of the top five DarkNet Marketplaces sell weapons while three of the top five sell stolen financial data." This is a darker DarkNet and it speaks to the challenge facing law enforcement as they knock one set of bad actors offline, another comes along with bigger and bolder intentions.
Evolution Marketplace is a much different animal than Silk Road, according to Dan Palumbo. Evolution sells "weapons, stolen credit cards, and more nefarious items that were forbidden on both versions of Silk Road. Silk Road sold a lot of dangerous things, but operators drew the line at their version of 'victimless crimes,' i.e. no child pornography, weapons, or identity theft. Now, four of the top five DarkNet Marketplaces sell weapons while three of the top five sell stolen financial data." This is a darker DarkNet and it speaks to the challenge facing law enforcement as they knock one set of bad actors offline, another comes along with bigger and bolder intentions.
seems to be the delivery channel . I mean seriously, who would like to recieve a package of contraband delivered !! to an address !!! ... True blue anonymity is still far away ... ( resistance is futile kinda situation for now )
Anonymity in all its forms can be used for nefarious purposes. Isn't that right, Mr. Anonymous Coward?
Some say that anonymity is a fundamental right, like free speech. Free speech allows people to say bad things, and anonymity allows them do do bad things online, but in both cases, curtailing those rights is not an option, and does more harm than good besides. For some, running a TOR node or contributing to such projects is their way of asserting the right to anonymity, which is indeed for the greater good.
In addition, making providers of a platform (be it TOR, and ISP, or a discussion board) responsible for the content being moved over that platform is rather impractical. If such responsibility is legally enforced, it'll be the end of the open Internet. And of privacy and encryption, by the way (though I see a new market for steganography)
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Some say that anonymity is a fundamental right, like free speech.
Some say that there's no such thing, but that free speech is necessary if you want a free society, and that anonymity is necessary for free speech, thus it should be protected.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"