Earlier this month The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), along with Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), Europol and Dutch National Police has seized and taken down two of the most popular marketplaces AlphaBay and Hansa.
In capsule:
- AlphaBay and Hansa were shut down in a coordinated operation from US and Europe authorities.
- Alexandre Cazes, one of the admins of AlphaBay, was arrested in Thailand and found dead in the cell.
- This is the third successful joint operation by authorities from the US and Europe to shut down illegal platforms
Earlier this month The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), along with Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), Europol and Dutch National Police has seized and taken down two of the most popular marketplaces AlphaBay and Hansa. However one of the admins of AlphaBay, Alexandre Cazes was arrested by Thai police and but now he has been found dead in the cell. DeSnake, another name for Alexander Cazes who was living in Thailand for last 8 years, was arrested upon US request and was waiting for extradition to the US and an hour before the scheduled meeting with the public prosecutors for the extradition, he was found hanged in the cell by the guards.
AlphaBay is believed to be created in 2014 and was one of the largest Dark Web marketplaces after Silk Road went offline. On 4th of July the suddenly the site went offline and users thought that site admin has scammed them and stole their funds.
According to the authorities, Hansa market was under the control of Feds from June 20th, and they secretly monitored activities of the vendors and buyers for a month. However, now Europol has announced that the authorities have seized and shut down AlphaBay and Hansa which are responsible for the trading of over 350000 illicit commodities including drugs, firearms and cybercrime malware.
In a press release by Rob Wainwright, Europol Executive Director said that “This is an outstanding success by authorities in Europe and the US. The capability of drug traffickers and other serious criminals around the world has taken a serious hit today after a highly sophisticated joint action in multiple countries,”In last two years by the joint operation of authorities in US and Europe has brought down 4 illegal platforms including AlphaBay and HansaIn July 2016 they shut down Kickass Torrents - the world's top website for illegally sharing movies, TV shows, and music and arrested its owner Artem Vaulin.The Silk Road, like AlphaBay which was the largest Dark Web marketplace at that time, was also shut down by the authorities and Ross William Ulbricht, the owner of the Silk Road was arrested and sentenced to prison for life.
