Monday, February 4, 2013

Australian man to be sentenced for drug activities on Silk Road

According to Australian newspaper The Age, an Melbourne man has pleaded guilty to drug crimes after being caught purchasing and selling drugs including cocaine, LSD, and methamphetamine on the black market website Silk Road.

The website is hidden behind the Tor network and is a marketplace for nearly all types of contraband. According to Wikipedia, the site's monthly sales are estimated at about $1.2 million. Sales are conducted using Bitcoin, an online currency providing anonymity to transactions.

The defendant began using the site due to financial pressure from having to close another business. He claims to have learned of Silk Road from an article published in a newspaper (which leads me to wonder if us continuing to write about Silk Road is just going to convince you to become account holders). The defendant faces up to 25 years in prison.

Silk Road has been a tough one to crack for governments around the world. Read more about what little is known of the U.S. government's response here.

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