A geographical analysis of trafficking on a popular darknet market
Graphical abstract
Introduction
The Internet continues to play an important role in illegal trafficking. It acts as a facilitator, providing another medium for sales and purchases, and a platform for information sharing between users. Users can access both legal and illegal commodities online from anywhere around the world [1]. Cryptomarkets, located on the darknet, are only the last illustration of the transition from illegal markets in the real world to the virtual world [2]. Visually very similar to popular merchant websites like eBay and Amazon, cryptomarkets share several structural features with conventional online sales sites. Lists of products and services offered by sellers are organised into categories and subcategories. Sellers – and their products – are evaluated according to the feedback left by their previous customers, trust and reputation being central components of the trade on cryptomarkets [3]. Unlike conventional sales sites, however, cryptomarkets facilitate exchanges in a context where the anonymity of administrators and participants is protected thanks to the combination of encryption features. They are the connections through relays to make them anonymous (using for instance the TOR – The Onion Router – browser) [4], the automatic encryption of all communications through PGP – Pretty Good Privacy – cryptography [5] and the payments with decentralised cryptocurrencies, mainly bitcoins [6].
At the end of 2014, judicial authorities and law enforcement agencies from worldwide countries launched an operation, codenamed “Operation Onymous”, to take down the marketplaces selling illegal items, such as drugs and weapons, on the darknet (Eurojust, 2014).1 Although this operation was successful, the cryptomarkets community was prompt to adapt and thus new marketplaces were developed [7]. Considering the perpetual evolution of crime and the importance of the Internet in illicit activities, analysing any illicit market should rely on a more holistic approach and consider the physical (i.e. traditional trafficking) as well as the virtual (i.e. online trafficking) dimensions of the market. This analysis would enable a deeper understanding of the structure of criminal groups online and potentially draw the link between the virtual world and the physical world which is not currently known. Furthermore, analysing cryptomarkets represents an interesting approach to inform on trends and dynamics that may affect the offline market. A geographical analysis would also fuel hypotheses to better understand the role of cryptomarkets as a new distribution channel, as sellers can source as well as sell drugs online. Sellers may also move their trade to sell all or part of their merchandise while producers may decide to eliminate certain intermediaries and sell directly to consumers [8]. Combining geographical analysis with general knowledge about the traditional market might highlight the presence of new actors (e.g. producers or retailers) and clarify the role played by cryptomarkets in the distribution chain. In addition, from a country-specific perspective, trends regarding different categories of product might be detected, and eventually monitored, from both demand and supply points of view.
Despite the added value of a geographical analysis, only a few studies provide a country-specific perspective and they are focused on drug trafficking hosted on the darknet market named Agora [9], [10]. Differences in the availability of specific substances among shipping countries were observed through these studies. It was concluded that spatial specificity can be due to different factors affecting countries differently, such as geographic isolation, stringent border controls, relaxed laws in regards to illicit goods, high prices of goods, strict control of Internet access, proximity to producing countries, domestic productions of goods and relative availability of illicit goods [9]. Most research on cryptomarkets has focused on drugs to evaluate the structure of the market [2], [7], [11], characteristics of vendors [12], [13], [14], consumers/users’ demand [15], [16], the investigation of sales volume [7], vendors’ activity [17], wholesale vs. retail [18] and the coherence between digital and physical information [19]. A few agencies have developed monitoring strategies, recording illicit drug activities and publishing their results into periodical or casual reports [20]. A European project, mainly centered on the drug situation in the Netherlands, took place in 2016 and resulted in the RAND report [21]. In 2016, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) published a report about the Internet and drug markets.2 Other projects are based on interviews with drug market users, concerning the type of products proposed and their level of satisfaction, and resulted in the Global Drug Survey 2016.3 In a few words, literature shows that cryptomarkets are dominated by English-speaking countries (the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia) and Western European countries (in particular, the Netherlands) and the main offered and purchased illicit drugs are cannabis, stimulants (cocaine and amphetamines), ecstasy (MDMA) and psychedelics (NPS, LSD) [9], [11], [16], [21].
Although drugs are offered and sold prolifically online; various illegal services and products related to financial or identity fraud as well as counterfeit goods are also offered on the cryptomarkets. To our knowledge, no information is available on the proportions of these categories on darknet markets. In this context, this study will provide information on the types and frequencies of all the products offered on Evolution. Geographic information will also be analysed to highlight specific patterns in the trafficking of certain substances or goods and reveal specificities of the illicit market for a particular country (e.g. the specialisation in the distribution of certain types of products). Such analysis will provide a comparison of the distribution of physical and digital products and help to explain the relation between the shipping country and the type of product. In most studies, only the shipping country is analysed. Here, a combined analysis of shipping countries and destinations will be performed to highlight trafficking flows and therefore evaluate the trafficking nature from certain countries (i.e. domestic vs. international). Lastly, the structure of illicit drug trafficking as well as its geographic distribution will be investigated. The results will be confronted with knowledge regarding the traditional market to assess the relationship between the online and offline markets. The New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) will be specifically studied to evaluate which countries are at the forefront of the trafficking and even their role in the distribution chain. This specific example will indicate to what extent the online trade reflects the traditional trafficking.
Section snippets
Dataset and methodology
The cryptomarket Evolution was studied since it was a popular cryptomarket during its period of activity, from January to March 2015.4 In particular, it was very attractive to users since it survived “Operation Onymous” in late 2014 [20]. The dataset used in this study is a compilation of source codes collected, gathered and released by an independent researcher named Gwern Brawnen.5
Products offered
The extraction of each listing source code for every crawling date led to the identification of 92′980 unique sale proposals, after discarding six listings that stated unclear shipping country information. A total number of 4171 distinct vendor usernames was detected. Results show that a vendor may manage one or more listings (min = one listing, max = 1′441, median = 9, mean = 22, standard deviation = 49).
Most of the sale proposals (63%) concern licit or illicit drugs and paraphernalia, in particular,
General discussion and conclusion
Through the analysis of a dataset containing information about 4171 vendors and 92,980 sale proposals, this study aimed first at investigating the type and proportions of products offered for sale on Evolution, a popular darknet marketplace in 2014–2015. Then, this article studied the trafficking flows and geographical specificities in the trafficking of the different types of products, in particular illicit drugs. Finally, NPS were especially studied to show how digital data can inform on the
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