German police closed the Russian marketplace of illegal goods Hydra. He sold drugs, forged documents and stolen data in Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Among competitors, Hydra held the record for revenue, with $1.3 billion in 2020 alone.
In turn, the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the US Department of the Treasury (OFAC) imposed sanctions on the world's largest and most famous darknet market, Hydra (Hydra). About how Hydra worked in the material Rucriminal.info, based on documents from the US Department of the Treasury.
Hydra was launched in 2015 and is the most famous darknet market in Russia and the largest darknet market in the world. Hydra's offerings include ransomware, hacking services and software, stolen personal information, counterfeit currency, stolen virtual currency, and drugs.
An OFAC investigation uncovered approximately $8 million in ransomware proceeds that flowed through Hydra virtual currency accounts, including Ryuk, Sodinokibi and Conti ransomware variants. According to blockchain researchers, approximately 86 percent of illegal bitcoins received directly by Russian virtual currency exchanges in 2019 came from Hydra. Prior to today's action, Hydra's revenue has skyrocketed from less than $10 million in 2016 to over $1.3 billion in 2020. This increase in profits is possible thanks to Hydra's connection to Russian illicit finance.
Hydra was an online criminal marketplace that allowed users primarily from Russian-speaking countries to buy and sell illegal goods and services, including illegal drugs, stolen financial information, fake identification documents, and money laundering services. Transactions on Hydra were conducted in cryptocurrencies, and Hydra operators charged a fee for each transaction conducted on Hydra.
In connection with the closure of Hydra, the US also announced the criminal prosecution of 30-year-old Dmitry Olegovich Pavlov, a resident of Russia, for conspiracy to distribute drugs and conspiracy to launder money in connection with his operation and administration of servers used by Hydra.
According to the indictment, which is in the possession of Rucriminal.info, sellers on Hydra could create accounts on the site to advertise their illegal products, and buyers could create accounts to view and purchase the suppliers' products. Hydra vendors offered various illicit drugs for sale, including cocaine, methamphetamine, LSD, heroin, and other opioids. Vendors openly advertised their drugs on Hydra, usually including photos and a description of the controlled substance. Buyers rated sellers and their products on a five-star rating system, and seller ratings and reviews were prominently displayed on the Hydra website.
Hydra also featured numerous vendors selling fake IDs. Users could search for vendors that sell identification documents, such as US passports or driver's licenses, and filter or sort by item price. Many sellers of fake IDs have offered to personalize documents based on photos or other information provided by buyers.
Numerous vendors also sold hacking tools and hacking services through Hydra. Hacker service providers typically offered illegal access to online accounts of the buyer's choice. Thus, buyers could choose their victims and hire professional hackers to access victims' messages and take over their accounts.
Hydra providers also offered a wide range of money laundering and so-called "cash out" services that allowed Hydra users to convert their bitcoin (BTC) into various forms of currency supported by Hydra's wide range of providers. In addition, Hydra offered an internal mixing service to launder and then process withdrawals by providers. Mixing services allowed customers to send bitcoins to designated recipients for a fee in a way that obscures the source or owner of the bitcoins. Hydra's money laundering features were so sought after that some users created shell provider accounts specifically to transfer money through Hydra's Bitcoin wallets as a laundering method.
According to the telegram channel of the Cheka-OGPU, since about November 2015, Pavlov has been managing the Promservice LLC company, also known as the Full Drive Hosting Company, All Wheels and 4x4host.ru, which administered the Hydra servers (Promservis "). At the time, Pavlov, through his company Promservice, managed the Hydra servers, allowing the marketplace to function as a platform used by thousands of people.
dealers and other illegal sellers to distribute large quantities of illegal drugs and other illegal goods and services to thousands of buyers and launder the billions of dollars generated from these illegal transactions.
As an active administrator of Hydra's servers, Pavlov allegedly colluded with other Hydra operators to promote the site's success by providing the critical infrastructure that allowed Hydra to operate and thrive in the competitive dark web marketplace. At the same time, Pavlov allegedly facilitated the activities of Hydra and allowed Hydra to receive millions of dollars in commissions received from illegal sales conducted through the site.
To be continued
Alexey Ermakov
Source: www.rucriminal.info
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