The international darknet drugs trade - a regional analysis of cryptomarkets

This chapter presents a descriptive analysis of illicit drug trading conducted via cryptomarkets, ‘eBay’ style marketplaces operating on the darknet (Martin 2014a, 2014b). Over the past seven years, cryptomarkets have emerged as a significant new vector for the retail and delivery of illicit drugs. One of the least understood aspects of cryptomarket-facilitated drug trading concerns the location of vendors who use the darknet to trade illicit drugs across national borders. While previous quantitative papers in this area have noted the locations of vendors selling drugs on cryptomarkets (eg Christin 2013; Soska & Christin 2015), these previous studies have not differentiated between vendors who are prepared to sell drugs to international or domestic-only clientele. The aim of this research is to fill this gap in knowledge and determine which countries are the most active, in terms of both domestic-only and internationally oriented drug vendors, as well as which countries dominate the trade in particular drugs, specifically cannabis, ecstasy-type products, cocaine, methamphetamine and opioids

Partenariats criminels au sein d'un forum de carding: alliés, rivaux ou escrocs ? Étude de l'utilisation d'identités virtuelles multiples

Sur les marchés de carding en ligne, de grandes quantités d'informations financières volées sont vendues et achetées à bas prix. Ces marchés pourraient constituer une menace importante pour les établissements financiers et les victimes. Cependant, le risque pourrait être moins important qu'attendu car les membres de ces communautés sont régulièrement victimisées par leurs pairs. Le but de cette recherche est d'évaluer la stabilité de ces marchés en s'intéressant au niveau de supercherie au sein d'un forum de carding. Cet article présente une méthode de détection des participants qui possèdent plusieurs identités virtuelles (comptes utilisateurs) afin de tromper les autres. Le profil d'utilisation des différents comptes d'une même personne est analysé. L'approche présentée est discutée sous l'angle forensique, particulièrement pertinent pour interpréter les liens faits entre différents comptes utilisateurs attribués à une même personne

Studying illicit drug trafficking on Darknet markets: structure and organisation from a Canadian perspective

Cryptomarkets are online marketplaces that are part of the Dark Web and mainly devoted to the sale of illicit drugs. They combine tools to ensure anonymity of participants with the delivery of products by mail to enable the development of illicit drug trafficking. Using data collected on eight cryptomarkets, this study provides an overview of the Canadian illicit drug market. It seeks to inform about the most prevalent illicit drugs vendors offer for sale and preferred destination countries. Moreover, the research gives an insight into the structure and organisation of distribution networks existing online. In particular, we provide information about how vendors are diversifying and replicating across marketplaces. We inform on the number of listings each vendor manages, the number of cryptomarkets they are active on and the products they offer. This research demonstrates the importance of online marketplaces in the context of illicit drug trafficking. It shows how the analysis of data available online may elicit knowledge on criminal activities. Such knowledge is mandatory to design efficient policy for monitoring or repressive purposes against anonymous marketplaces. Nevertheless, trafficking on Dark Net markets is difficult to analyse based only on digital data. A more holistic approach for investigating this crime problem should be developed. This should rely on a combined use and interpretation of digital and physical data within a single collaborative intelligence model