Over a year after the shuttering of the original Silk Road website and over a month after the seizure of Silk Road 2 and other similar sites, the sketchiest of Dark Web sites still persist.
According to a new report published Thursday from the Digital Citizens Alliance (DCA), an advocacy group, Evolution Marketplace has long passed Silk Road “as the largest illegal black market for drugs before the takedown." Others include Agora Marketplace, Nucleus Marketplace, and a number of smaller ones.
As of this week, Evolution has over 26,000 listings for drugs, weapons, pornography, and more.
"Evolution Marketplace is a much different animal than Silk Road," Dan Palumbo, the group’s research director, said in a statement.
"They sell 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. 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."
We have standards, after all
Like the previous incarnations of Silk Road, Evolution (or “Evo" as it’s known to its users) requires Tor to use and boasts a slew of questionable goods, all available for sale in bitcoins. Evo itself takes in between 2.5 and 4 percent of all transactions.Signing up for the site takes just a few moments—no e-mail address or anything else is even required. Ars decided to create an account and take a dive into Evolution. (Like our previous account on Silk Road 2, this reporter has created an account on Evolution under the username “cfarivar," but has zero intention to purchase or sell any items.)
In a look on Thursday, Ars found nearly 15,000 drug-related listings, by far the most popular on the site: cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana, and other controlled substances were listed. Amongst other popular categories of digital goods were various hacking guides, pirated software, and even malware. A fake Colorado driver’s license sells for just 0.257 bitcoins ($80).
There are some lines that Evo will not cross, however. Under its “Forbidden Goods" (Tor, Evolution login required) page, the site states:
We do not condone the sales or promotion of goods that are deemed unsuitable for the Evolution Marketplace. This includes, but is not limited to:
Child Pornography
Services related to murder, assassination and/or terrorism.
Services related to sex and/or prostitution.
HYIP, Ponzi-schemes or other investment programs.
Lotteries and raffles.
Just as with its predecessors, Evolution has an active user forum that has been going since the site’s beginning in January 2014, just a few short months after the original Silk Road was seized by federal authorities. Earlier this month, one of the site’s administrators, Verto, said the group had hired someone (Tor, Evolution login required) to even run public relations.
A background in financial crime
Evolution does feature a handful of security-minded features that its predecessor sites did not have, including an option to perform “multi-signature transactions" that enable the buyer’s bitcoins to be put into an escrow account. That account, in turn, is controlled by the seller, buyer, and by Evolution itself. To move the money to the seller, two of those entities must agree.
According to Wired, Verto is also the administrator of Tor Carding Forum (TCF), a longstanding “private forum that charges $50 to join, has long maintained a brisk trade in stolen financial details."
But, on Thursday, Verto announced (Tor, Evolution login required) on Evolution that he would be closing TCF.
After many successful years I have decided to close TCF. There are several reasons including significant decline of quality contributions, what to do with sales/escrow, but ultimately I no longer have the time to run both TCF and Evolution. The site will remain online for a while to allow members to save any important messages or conclude any outstanding business, however new registrations are permanently disabled.
On behalf of current and former TCF staff, thanks for all your support and we'll see you around Evolution Forums!
Neither Verto, nor the other administrator, Kimble, immediately responded to Ars’ request for comment.
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