One of the largest Darknet markets, Hydra Market, has been closed down by German police law enforcement. The illegal platform's servers were seized by the German authorities, allowing them to confiscate more than $25 million worth of Bitcoin.
A participant sits with a laptop computer as he attends the annual Chaos Communication Congress of the Chaos Computer Club at the Berlin Congress Center on December 28, 2010 in Berlin, Germany. The Chaos Computer Club is Europe's biggest network of computer hackers and its annual congress draws up to 3,000 participants.
The operation was completed on Apr. 5 by the General Prosecutor's Office in Frankfurt am Main and Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA).
The Hydra market has been operating in Germany for the past few years. But now, its illegal works are over.
Largest Darknet Market Shut Down!
According to Bloomberg's latest report, the massive Darknet market has been used for money laundering, drug trafficking, and other illegal activities.
A visual representation of the digital Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin on December 07, 2017 in London, England. Cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Lightcoin have seen unprecedented growth in 2017, despite remaining extremely volatile. While digital currencies across the board have divided opinion between financial institutions.
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Back in 2020, it was able to generate more than $1.3 billion in revenue. In 2022, the Frankfurt prosecutors' anti-cybercrime team said that the platform has more than 17 million client accounts and 19,000 sales accounts.
In 2021, the Hydra Market was used by more than 500,000 anonymous individuals to trade cryptocurrencies as well as drugs illegally.
Now, the German police law enforcement said that around 543 Bitcoin were seized on Tuesday, Apr. 5.
"The seizures carried out today were preceded by elaborate investigations, which have been conducted by the BKA and the ZIT since August 2021 and in which several US authorities were involved," said the German authorities via their official press release.
How Serious is Hydra Market?
BKA and ZIT said this darknet marketplace might have the highest turnover worldwide. This means that there are lots of illegal activities happening within the Hydra Market platform.
On the other hand, the blockchain forensics firm, Ciphetrace, claimed that the massive darknet market platform was used to help some countries in their classified transactions.
These include Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Moldova, and Uzbekistan. If you want to learn more about the Hydra Market, you can view this link.
In October 2021, another massive darkweb marketplace was closed down, thanks to the efforts made by the European Union's law enforcement agency.
Meanwhile, authorities in Oklahoma recently claimed that the Tulsa cyberattack leaked residents' information to darkweb.
For more news updates about Hydra Market and other market platforms in the darknet, always keep your tabs open here at TechTimes.
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Written by: Griffin Davis
