Silk Road (Website)

What Was Silk Road?

Silk Road was a digital black market platform that was famous for facilitating money laundering activities and illegal medication transactions utilizing Bitcoin. Silk Road, viewed as the first darknet market, was sent off in 2011 and eventually shut down by the FBI in 2013. It was established by Ross William Ulbricht, who is currently carrying out a life punishment in jail for his job in Silk Road.

Since that time, several other darknet markets have risen.

Figuring out Silk Road

The digital period has brought numerous technology innovations to our home fronts and disturbed life as far as we might be concerned. We can now conduct transactions online with ecommerce sites, pay for online transactions utilizing virtual currency, get loans online utilizing social lending sites, operate secretly on the web utilizing data anonymization technology, and even interface with company spotters utilizing social media sites. The rundown of digital technology creations continues endlessly and wanders into each sector of the world economy, like the financial sector or the retail sector. An increase in the utilization of cyber technology like cryptocurrency and ecommerce marketplaces prompted an increase in the demand for data privacy. Demand for privacy brought about an increase in regulation and laws over how data is utilized as well as an increase in mechanical devices and platform made to serve users who favor namelessness. While the commencement of data anonymization apparatuses helps in protecting users' personally identifiable data (PII), these devices are additionally utilized by elements who mean to conduct illegal and crimes. In 2011, the Silk Road was conceived out of a need to interface illegal medication venders with intrigued buyers online while protecting their personalities and transactions utilizing anonymization strategies.

Through a combination of data anonymization technology and a feedback trading system, Silk Road made a haven for drug traders. The site was open just through a network known as Tor, which exists principally to anonymize client data and activities online. Tor jumbles users' locations so they seem hidden to undesirable gatherings hoping to watch the client's transactions and activities. Consequently, Silk Road buyers and dealers shamelessly conducted illegal medication transactions unafraid of their IP addresses being followed back to them. Another explanation Silk Road flourished was the buyer feedback carried out on the platform. Buyers typically would give feedback on merchants after receipt of the goods. The feedback received was then utilized by the site to remove fraudulent venders, while reputable merchants had their products exceptionally pursued. This advanced buyer confidence on the online platform.

All trades on Silk Road were conducting utilizing the undeniably famous digital currency known as Bitcoin. Each Bitcoin transaction is recorded on a public ledger, which is effectively open to legal and regulatory bodies. Due to the transparency apparent in Bitcoin transactions, dark wallets were created with the primary purpose of scrambling and veiling all Bitcoin transactions. Silk Road participants who utilized these Bitcoin wallets to fund their transactions partook in an additional layer of privacy.

The Fall of Silk Road

The Silk Road came to its destruction in 2013 after the FBI, subsequent to learning about the presence of the hidden marketplace, plotted with the DEA, IRS, and Customs agents. Albeit the federal agents admitted that the utilization of Tor and Bitcoin to cloud addresses were major obstructions that they experienced, they were as yet able to crack down on the underground medication market.

The FBI shut down the site permanently, held onto more than 144,000 bitcoins (then valued at $34 million), and captured a number of users of the site including the organizer, Ross Ulbricht, who made about $80 million in commissions from transactions carried out inside the site. Ulbricht was indicted in 2015 and is right now carrying out a life punishment without the possibility of parole.

Features

• The FBI shut down Silk Road in 2013 and its organizer Ross Ulbricht was condemned to jail forever.
• The Silk Road was an online black market where buyers and dealers of illegal or untrustworthy things could execute namelessly.
• Using privacy procedures, for example, the Tor network and cryptocurrency transactions, individuals had the option to execute in drugs, hacked passwords, illegal data, and other stash.