The marketplace is well-known for its bug bounty programs and robust security mechanisms, including mandatory 2FA. Classic darknet markets sell diverse illegal goods; data stores focus on leaked or stolen data like credentials, databases, and ID records. Launched in 2023, STYX focuses on financial crime, providing stolen credit card data, hacked bank accounts and access to various cryptocurrency laundering tools. The first category includes classic marketplaces, which serve as one-stop shops for a wide range of illegal goods. These platforms sell everything from drugs and fake IDs to weapons and hacking tools, resembling a digital black-market bazaar.

Additionally, PhantomX employs a decentralized hosting model, making it resistant to takedowns and ensuring continuous availability. A kilo of speed has remained stable at around £1,000, while a kilo of MDMA crystal briefly rose from £5,000 up to £5,500, then came back down to £5,000. A pack of 100,000 valium pills was being offered for an average price of £10,000, while a batch of 1,000 2C-B pills goes for roughly £1,950. The average price of mephedrone, which some vendors have described as being of “pre-2010 ban quality” is £5,000 a kilo.

What Are Darknet Markets? Complete Guide
The top 10 for the period also included users from Germany (2.77%), Turkmenistan (2.39%), China (2.38%), France (1.83%), United Kingdom (1.77%), Netherlands (1.37%), and India (1.27% of Tor’s daily bridge users). Number of monthly newly-appeared and disappeared listings in the marketplaces Agora and Evolution. Note that data for 2020 only included data from January to March; price per gram is in US $. Our modification of the semantic comparison model will generate comparable word embeddings for opioid jargon words in legitimate documents (ie, benign corpora embedding) and in underground corpora (ie, underground corpora embedding).
Association Of Drugs For Sale On The Internet And Official Health Indicators: Darknet Parsing And Correlational Study
In comparison, heroin was identified in 55.2% (52,510/95,011) of all opioid-related listings, and there were 1,945 heroin-related listings per each crawl, on average. Lamy reviewed the literature, wrote the first draft of the paper, and analyzed the data. For those who are averse to confrontation, and who are sufficiently tech-savvy, the dark web offers an alternative to the risk and violence of dealing drugs offline. Both of these claims correspond with previous research showing that the dark web is perceived to be a safer place to buy and sell drugs. One of the biggest problems cybersecurity teams face isn’t a lack of tools — it’s too many alerts. And beware—while many explore out of curiosity or for research purposes, it’s important to remember that engaging with these platforms, even as an observer, can lead to serious legal and ethical consequences.
First, we learned how many drugs, in grams per 100,000 population, were found on the “shelves” of the Hydra dark market on a subnational level. In 2019, on an average day, the total quantity of drugs available for purchase on the darknet, in batches of 5 g or less, amounted to 124 kg. It was a period of COVID-19 restrictions, so we have data on the decreasing amounts of drugs distributed monthly in Russia during COVID-19 restrictions.
Common Scams And Fraudulent Activities On Darknet Markets
- It has a bidding feature, with new batches of stolen data being frequently added.
- In fact, by 2013, a Guardian article revealed that about 70% of listings were drug-related.
- Like most of the markets, STYX supports Bitcoin (BTC), Monero (XMR), and other crypto tokens to keep everyone’s identity hidden on this marketplace.
- It supports operations in multiple languages and operates on both clearnet and Tor.
- Users and sellers use the cryptocurrency “Bitcoin” to complete their deals.
With its fast rise to fame and focus on money fraud, it’s no surprise that cybersecurity experts are keeping a very close eye on this one. Want to get illegal drugs, fake passports, Trojan, or other cyber attack software? Next up is Abacus, another newer market that has already made a massive name for itself, especially following AlphaBay’s closure. It contains 40,000+ listings for illegal products (mostly) and is worth an estimated $15 million, so it’s one of the largest markets out there.
Dark Web Marketplaces

I try to provide the best products and service I can, when someone has a problem or claims their order was short on pills (as long as they have ordered from me before) I usually take them at their word. Border forces seized more than 1.5 tons of ketamine between 2021 and 2022 compared to an average of around 180 kilos per year over the last decade. The huge drop in price is likely influenced by a rise in ketamine production in the Golden Triangle.
Explicit And Illegal Content
Of the surveyed countries, Germany (65%), India (58%), and the United States (55%) had the smallest share of people unfamiliar with the Dark Web. To evaluate the aforementioned methods for extracting properties, we randomly chose 1000 listings for each property and manually annotated the properties as ground truth. We evaluated our method on our annotated data set, which yields an accuracy of over 90% for each property extraction, as shown in Table 5. To identify forum posts related to opioid commodity promotion and review, our methodology was designed to filter forum posts with opioid keywords and then use a classifier to the posts with the topics of interest. The classifier was built upon transfer learning and a crafted objective function that heavily weighs the penalty of misclassifying a positive instance.
Guide To Darknet Markets
For instance, cybercriminals can buy credit card details with a $5,000 balance for just $110. This not only helps protect your identity but also contributes to your overall cybersecurity in the digital age. By adopting a few straightforward rules and habits, you can make it more difficult for hackers to access your data and remove yourself from their line of sight. While these guidelines may appear complex and bothersome initially, they will become second nature once you become accustomed to them.
Did The Silk Road Marketplace Go Under?

Unlike more rural or sparsely populated areas, drug use tends to be more prevalent in densely populated cities like Saint Petersburg and Moscow, like the Chechen Republic. Increased accessibility, larger populations, or different socioeconomic conditions could all be to blame. The data collection and analysis were subject to various analytical procedures used and implemented to provide a detailed understanding of the prevalence of the hidden drug “zakladka” and its impact on population health across Russia and every region. Descriptive statistics were implemented, and the initial analysis involved calculating the average amounts of different drugs per 100,000 population across all regions. In contrast to Russian-language DNMs, Western darknet marketplaces continued to struggle throughout 2024 as a result of sustained law enforcement action, coupled with several high profile exit scams. Only four Russian-language DNMs left the approximately 20-strong ecosystem in 2024.

The Rise Of Darknet Drug Markets: Privacy And Efficiency In Trade
- This incident also marked the never-before-seen attempt of its administrator, Pharoah (arrested in May 2024 and revealed to be 23 year-old Taiwanese national Rui-Siang Lin), to extort the marketplace’s users.
- Its commitment to privacy, diverse product offerings, and robust security measures make it a preferred choice for users seeking discreet transactions within the darknet.
- It’s the place where you can buy or sell stolen credit card numbers, SSH login credentials, and personally identifiable information (PII).
- These platforms leverage advanced encryption technologies, decentralized systems, and user-friendly interfaces to ensure seamless transactions.
- For other novel synthetic opioids, U-48,800 was advertised on average U.S.$.48.4 per gram for retail-level amounts and U.S.$14.2 per gram for listings offering wholesale-level amounts.
As the darknet ecosystem evolves, it continues to adapt to user needs, offering a reliable and secure environment for trade. In conclusion, the darknet continues to evolve, providing a secure and efficient platform for drug trade. By 2025, markets like PhantomX, NebulaTrade, and EclipseMarket are expected to dominate, offering users a combination of privacy, reliability, and variety. You can use a dark web scan tool to tell if your data has landed on the dark web.
It’s one of the largest darknet markets that launched in 2022 and trades sensitive financial credential transactions. It’s the place where you can buy or sell stolen credit card numbers, SSH login credentials, and personally identifiable information (PII). Nemesis was established in 2021 and operated as a criminal marketplace on the darknet, an encrypted network within the Internet that can only be accessed with special anonymity-enhancing browsers. Drug traffickers active on Nemesis sold fentanyl around the world, both on its own and surreptitiously laced into other drugs.