“Hydra Market” is believed to be the illegal marketplace with the highest turnover in the world. The marketplace’s sales amounted to at least 1.23 billion euros in 2020 alone. The focus of the Russian-language darknet platform, which has been accessible via the Tor network since at least 2015, was the trade in illegal narcotics, and spied-out data as well as fake documents and digital services were also offered profitably around the world.
Around 17 million customer and over 19,000 seller accounts were registered on the marketplace. Today, Bitcoins worth the equivalent of around 23 million euros were seized, which are attributed to the marketplace. Today's measures were preceded by extensive investigations that have been conducted by the BKA and the ZIT since August 2021 and in which several US authorities were involved.
Servers of the world's largest darknet marketplace were confiscated and 543 Bitcoins with a total value of around 23 million euros were seized
The Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor's Office - Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) - and the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) secured the server infrastructure of the world's largest illegal darknet marketplace "Hydra Market" in Germany today and closed it. Bitcoins worth the equivalent of around EUR 23 million were seized, which are attributed to the marketplace.
The investigation pending at the ZIT in this regard is directed against the previously unknown operators and administrators of the platform mentioned. They are suspected, among other things, of commercially operating criminal trading platforms on the Internet, of commercially providing or granting an opportunity to acquire or distribute narcotics without authorization, and of commercial money laundering.
The seizures carried out today were preceded by extensive investigations that have been conducted by the BKA and the ZIT since August 2021 and in which several US authorities were involved.
The illegal marketplace was a Russian-language darknet platform that has been accessible via the Tor network since at least 2015. Their focus was on the trade in illegal narcotics, and the platform also used the platform to profitably offer spied-out data, forged documents and digital services.
Around 17 million customer and over 19,000 seller accounts were registered on the marketplace.
According to ZIT and BKA, “Hydra Market” was probably the illegal marketplace with the highest turnover in the world. Its sales amounted to at least 1.23 billion euros in 2020 alone. In particular, the “Bitcoin Bank Mixer” provided by the platform, a service for obfuscating digital transactions, made crypto investigations immensely more difficult for law enforcement authorities.
The following security banner was published today on the Hydra-Market website:
The Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor's Office and the Federal Criminal Police Office would like to thank all security authorities involved for their excellent cooperation.
Source: Federal Criminal Police Office
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