This October has been a hard blow for dark web criminal organizations. After the capture at the beginning of the month of the administrator of the Bohemia/Cannabia dual drug and cyberattack market, the Finnish police have now announced the dismantling of the servers of Sipultie, another important portal for the sale and purchase of narcotics.
Sipultie began operating in February 2023, after the authorities managed to close its predecessor, Sipulimarket, in December 2020. This other online marketplace had reaped profits of more than €2 million since it began operating in April 2019.
The director of law enforcement at Finnish Customs, Hannu Sinkkonen, has assured that in addition to his administrator, they have been able to identify other collaborators, moderators and users, as well as drug sellers, so there could be more arrests in the coming days.
This news comes shortly after learning that the authorities in the Netherlands managed to capture one of the three administrators of Bohemia/Cannabia, a double market on the dark web in which drugs, cybercrime services such as malware and DDoS attacks, and other illegal products.
Although they announced it recently, the arrest occurred on June 27, 2024, and the online market had stopped operating in 2023. According to PolitieBohemia/Cannabia was the “world’s largest” market for illegal products on the dark web. Two suspects have also been arrested, one in the Netherlands and another in Ireland, and two vehicles and €8 million in cryptocurrency have been seized.
Large dark web markets
With these arrests, the dark web continues to lose massive international points of sale, since there have been more server closures that have occurred in recent months. Likewise, the authorities of the Netherlands have used the conquest of the server to launch a notice to surfers for those who enter the domain, with the title: «Active in dark markets? You have our attention”, followed by a list of all the individuals in different countries who have been arrested for their activities on the dark web.
Authorities from different countries have collaborated in both the closure of Bohemia/Cannabia and that of Sipultie. In the Bohemia case, American, English and Irish agents as well as Dutch agents participated, and in the Sipultie case, the Finnish police have worked together with Europol, the Swedish police and Polish authorities.
The Bohemia/Cannabia market was considerable, with around ‘82,000 listings daily worldwide. Around 67,000 transactions were carried out each month. The highest monthly turnover was 12 million euros (in September 2023). Never before have police found a dark web market of this size. The estimated income of the managers of this market is 5 million euros,” the Dutch police explain.
With these arrests, the European authorities show themselves capable of, in international collaboration with the police of different countries, identifying cybercriminals despite the difficulties that the use of the deep web represents due to the anonymity it provides.
