Dark Web Actors Fight For Drug Trafficking and Illegal Pharmacy Supremacy

The annual sale of illegal medications on the dark web exceeded $470m in 2022, reveals new information from Resecurity.

The report highlights the advancement of the shadow economy and new interaction procedures applied by criminals, including proprietary Android-dependent mobile applications and the start of an underground market called Kraken.

Additional precisely, the new report indicates that following the takedown of the Hydra Market by Germany’s Federal Felony Police Place of work in April 2022, at the very least 10 darknet marketplaces have risen to fill the regional void for drugs and other illicit merchandise.

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Between these is the aforementioned Kraken, which Resecurity claims has already amassed more than 1720 trustworthy sellers and outlets marketing illicit goods.

Most of the other underground marketplaces examined in the report were being noticed mainly fighting for model recognition.

“[We] detailed the growing tensions among distinctive influence teams behind illegal marketplaces in the dark web – attacking each individual other, carrying out DDoS attacks and striving to abuse the status of opponents to capture a greater market share,” the organization advised Infosecurity in a report summary by means of email.

Because of to these cyber battles, numerous actors have moved from the now-closed Hydra to new marketplaces and have started leveraging alternative digital channels, which include customized cellular apps and prompt messengers like Telegram.

“The ecosystem of drug gross sales on the dark web poses threats internationally, [with] a number of epicenters mostly concentrated in Eurasia and Central Asia and actively employed for drug trafficking,” said Resecurity.

The cybersecurity crew also discovered several drug stores on the dark web furnishing shoppers with personalized Android-based mostly phones with pre-installed apps employed for buys, protected communications and sending guidelines to couriers.

“The most effective way to defend you from counterfeit prescription medicines is to only purchase medications from dependable resources,” warned Resecurity. “This features certified pharmacies, possibly in human being or on the internet, that call for a prescription from a certified health care supplier.”

Searching forward, the security authorities explained they be expecting new marketplaces to arise in 2023.

“As outlined in the report, geopolitics and drug trafficking have grow to be inextricably connected, that’s why the quantity of shadow economic system in the dark web will [continue] to mature […] accelerated by ongoing tensions,” reads the advisory.

“The law enforcement community desires to build new methods to watch unlawful drug trades in the dark web and adjust their tactics to the dynamically shifting threat landscape.”

The Resecurity report will come months immediately after the Countrywide Crime Company (NCA) uncovered the identities of two drug traffickers immediately after they unwittingly took images of by themselves and a pet pet dog.