back to article EU cyber-cop: Dark-net crooks think they're beyond reach (until now)

Hundreds of website domains seized, 17 arrested and $1m in Bitcoin confiscated – Thursday was, apparently, a busy day for the West's cyber-cops. Operation Onymous, in which police and g-men in more than a dozen European countries as well as the US, has claimed some big scalps including the Silk Road 2.0, Hydra and Cannabis …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    That's OK :-).

    Once TOR is considered broken I can guarantee you there will be something stronger put in it's place..

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I don't know if you can improve much over TOR. I suspect bugs and traffic analysis allowed the plods to pin down the "hidden" servers. About the only way to beat traffic analysis is to reduce efficiency by introducing chaff the way Freenet does, but that means things move at a snail's pace. Meanwhile, I don't think there's much you can do about legally-planted bugs and the like. If you can't secure the endpoint, there goes your chain of trust right there...

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        I've been telling people, TOR was broken 7 years ago.

        First, the NSA broke it, then later the information was downgraded in classification so that information reaped from TOR could be utilized in court cases.

        If I were to hazard a guess, it's likely the other dark nets are also compromised.

        Beside the usual crypto breaking and various analytic methods available, there's also the fact that with sufficient computing power and IP redirects, one can own the majority of nodes and hence, own the majority of the traffic.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      RE: AC

      Thats assuming something better doesnt already exist.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: RE: AC

        Stop talking about Fight Club!

  2. quartzie
    FAIL

    Not even a Blip

    Once you realize that this (1M $ in Bitcoin) won't even register on the scale of the real evildoers (mafia, bankers, politicians), this announcement loses a lot of its fanfare.

    1. Fibbles

      Re: Not even a Blip

      Once you realise that it took significant effort from the top intelligence agencies of numerous Western countries to arrest 17 cannabis dealers this announcement loses a lot of its fanfare.

      You could arrest more by stopping strange smelling cars with tinted windows on a Saturday night.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Not even a Blip

        For the record, my car's got tinted windows as it was part of a "Dark and Cool" pack from VW and the strange smells are part dog, part kids farts and other assorted decaying items the kids have sneaked into the car without my knowledge.

  3. Brian Miller

    But TOR *IS* broken

    Let's see, what do we need to do? Establish a bunch of "evil" TOR exit nodes? And how much do "cloud" servers cost? And there you have it.

    But Silk Road 2.0 was broken through normal infiltration, and nothing else. ("Yeah, I'm a crook! I'm wearing a mask and carrying a crowbar." "Want to be a sysadmin on my evil site?") And then the Feds went on to do routine surveillance, which is something they are very good at.

    Personally I'd really like to see the "sellers" serve time. Really, offering contract killing? I would so love to see crap artists like that in the slammer.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: But TOR *IS* broken

      OK, so you create a malicious exit node, but how does that apply to hidden services where the traffic never leaves the network?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: But TOR *IS* broken

      Dear gods. Nobody ever taught you to TOR. Never exit TOR unencrypted.

      Point to point encryption between you a public VPN vendor so that your streams join the herd. Through that tunnel you open a second tunnel to a clean (read: pre-canned, known good template that you spin up as needed and destroy afterwards) tunnel-to-TOR relay server. (Usually a cheap-o cloudy widget.) This gets you on to the TOR network with enough effort required by those looking to trace you to keep them busy for weeks.

      Once on the TOR network you use a cryptoreflector hosted inside TOR (again, typically a disposable cloudy thing, dozens of people sell them.) These will accept your requests and pump them out to the wider internet via encrypted tunnel to yet another cloudy whatever.

      Tunnels all the way down, and good bloody luck associating any of your surfing with you, personally, unless you're dumb enough to allow cookies, keywords or DNS to leak in a manner that's traceable to you.

      Pay someone else to buy you pre-paid VISAs in cash, preferably at stores you've already scoped out to not have cameras. If someone does trace the cloudy instances to a VISA and runs down where they were bought, you want them to have as much misleading info as possible. (Get your mule to arrive by Taxi/Towncar for added obfuscation, and ensure transfer is done by dead drop in a null video zone.)

      The hardest part about all of this is building layers between yourself and the cash necessary to stand up proper cryptoreflectors. Properly organised, you'll have a dozen different setups for each layer and use them in random combination all mediated by scripts.

      I actually know someone who managed to stand up a series of meshnet nodes in his metro that allows them to pick an exit point and then enter the whole array through any of a dozen public WiFi access points. If you are serious about this sort of stuff, it's damned hard to get caught. But it takes time, it takes money, it takes preparation.

      It also takes premeditation. Things like putting "stupid filters" on your outbound traffic to make sure that no personally identifiable information, written tics, mannerisms or catch phrases exit into your cryptonet. Keep your bank usage and other personal stuff on the public net where they can see you. Act casual. Be normal.

      When working in the darknet you need to be someone else. Preferably multiple someone elses. Different typing cadence. Different word choices. Different spelling errors. Someone serious about their privacy will have applications that clean all this up and then introduce random errors, cadences, slang and jargon in order to ensure that nobody can get a "profile lock" on you.

      And that, my friends, is just making sure you aren't tracked when exiting TOR to browse publicly. It's anonymity 101. One of these days, I'll teach you how to interact with like-minded folk in dark fora.

      Cheers.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: But TOR *IS* broken

        I'd argue that with all this complexity you are likely to either become complacent over time or simply make a small mistake that brings you down. It is almost impossible for a human to keep up such complex actions/interactions on an ongoing basis.

        Just this

        When working in the darknet you need to be someone else. Preferably multiple someone elses. Different typing cadence. Different word choices. Different spelling errors.

        invokes images of a poor crime drama rather than anything in the real world.

        DPR, the original Silk Road kingpin, had a good run but failed in the end. The second coming's run was somewhat shorter, it seems largely through stupidity. If you set yourself up as a major league person of interest then it becomes easier to justify the resources needed to find you. Admittedly the cannabis busts are just pissing in the wind. It is also likely the sellers caught weren't particularly savvy but it will make some think twice about joining the next version - yes it's on Tor but if the guy running the show is an imbecile then I get jail time, maybe I think twice.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: But TOR *IS* broken

          This is why you automate as much as possible. Don't bother trying to create and maintain a persona with your frail human mind. Use output filters to handle your language. You be you into the computer, and let the computer be someone else.

          Apart from that, your comment sounds dangerously like "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear". Fuck you for that. Repeatedly.

          It doesn't matter what you or I have done. We're all people of interest. You don't have to be a drug dealer or pedophile to have an interest in privacy. Some people believe it is a fundamental right and are willing to put the time, money and effort in.

          And if the fascist fuckpopsicles want to spend millions of dollars trying to find out who I am just because I demand and enforce my privacy, then I am going to make them spend as many of those millions as is humanly possible. Billions, if I can. I want them to waste entire careers and the GDP of small nations trying to figure out who I am just because their own obsessive need for control freakery demands that noone be beyond their sight.

          ...but they'll have nothing to pin on me.

          In my nation privacy isn't illegal. Not yet. Not while I'm alive. So if I don't do anything illegal, then all they'll be doing is wasting time, money and effort tracking down the identity of an innocent person for no better reason than that they cannot bear to have someone outside their grasp.

          Good. I'll milk the fuckers for every drop.

          You may have nothing to hide, but you have everything to fear. All the more because you're so cowed that you actually believe it when they tell you that "you must comply".

          I am not a drone!

  4. Khaptain Silver badge

    I wonder how much this operation cost in relation to the catch

    Wouldn't it far more cost effective and in the public's interest to de-penalize cannabis and de-criminalize Class A Drugs

    The tax revenu from the cannabis alone would easily amount to several hundred times the magnitude of this small catch. This money could then be used to treat/support the serious addicts and there would still be some left over to pay for other public services. It would also free up police time in order for them to catch the truly serious criminals.

    On the contrary the current Cannabis Lords and Class A top level distributors are living the life of Flynn whilst remaining beyond the reach of the law... No-one collects any taxes, the police are running around playing whack-a-mole and junkies continue to make life miserable for themselves and their families.....

    [Or is it because some of them are actually in public positions, ie own private jets or have diplomatic immunity.....which would thereby cause some public outcry....]

    1. Mark 85

      While I totally agree with you, the drug lords won't go down without a fight. Maybe not physically, but I suspect that they'll take steps to legitimize their organizations as suppliers to the companies that would do the marketing. Meanwhile, everyone sets up their headquarters in a tax haven. The only place it will be taxed is by a sales tax. The corporate taxes will not be paid.

      However, the savings in law enforcement and prosecution costs will defer some of that money, maybe. I don't believe law enforcement will let this happen without a fight. They have a vested interest in power and revenue. Especially here in the States where they can confiscate assets, etc. of merely suspected drug dealers.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Optional

      It'll never happen drugs are "evil" in their eyes simply because they cannot currently tax them.

      If they was not earning so much money from cigarette tax money, that would be illegal too, same with alcohol.

      I often ask people this who say they want smoking banned and alcohol banned:

      If you successfully stop people drinking, and buying cigarettes, the government will loose BILLIONS of tax money.

      In which case, how do you think they are going to get that money back?

      Yup they will tax you more on other stuff so your bills will go up and your wages will be taxed more...

      So do you really want to stop smokers and alcoholics? I think not. Let them fork out the extra tax money...

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @Khaptain Problem is in the US is that people can lobby to keep their private prisons full, and therefore productive. And they do.

      The war on drugs never made sense in the first place...it was just a variation of a politician "tough on crime" speech that caught on.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      This is someone

      who does not understand the addictive powers of these drugs - that being the primary reason they are illegal.

      I'm a cop and I know numerous people who inject a dozen times a day and their life is ruined because of it. Legal or illegal, once you're hooked, it's downhill all the way.

      1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

        Re: This is someone

        Bullshit, There are plenty of drugs that fall into this category, but plenty that don't as well. Marijuana is a great example of a drug that the overwhelming majority of people are able to consume without abusing it. For that matter, so is codine.

        The problem is that some people abuse any substance they can find. That's not because those substances are inherently addictive: there are only a few hundred of substances that truly ought to be banned/prescription only due to physiological addictive properties. The issue is that we have no means of helping those with psychological addictions. Banning the substances hasn't helped, and it will never help. Finding a way to treat the psychological need to substance abuse is the key.

        Sadly, the there are still people who honestly believe prohibition works. They're idiots.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: This is someone

          "Sadly, the there are still people who honestly believe prohibition works. They're idiots."

          So, you would like there to be legally available heroin? What, so anyone over 18 can just mainline when they feel like it? Personally I'd prefer it banned as it currently is and for it to stay that way.

          1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

            Re: This is someone

            Heroin is one of the most addictive substances known. It has been scientifically proven to be so, and it has known chemical pathways that cause physiological addiction. As such, it should be controlled.

            Compare this to marijuana whose addictive properties are so vastly overblown that it's insane. There is basically no science to support physiological addiction in the overwhelming majority of humans. There is no rational reason for this substance to be restricted.

            Similarly, small doses of morphine or large doses of codeine have been proven to be physiologically addictive. But in small doses, many populations (such as Canada) have proven that they are perfectly capable of self regulating codeine.

            Codeine should be an over-the-counter offering dispensed by a pharmacist without the need of a prescription. The pharmacist can ensure that no large amounts are provided and that individuals purchasing the substance are aware of how to manage it properly.

            Just because some substances are known to cause physiological addiction does not mean that we lock up all substances which cause psychological addiction in a small group of individuals.

            Not all psychoactive substances are bad, and nothing other than a puritan outlook on life says that they are. Caffeine is a psychoactive substance. It's one that is responsible for some of the most complex interactions of which we are aware. Alcohol is a psychoactive substance that the overwhelming majority of people are able to handle responsibly. Glucose and Fructose are psychoactive substances that most people cannot handle responsibly, but they're available to children in fucking flavours.

            Check your biases. You are wrong about drugs. You don't understand that science and you are reacting emotionally and irrationally.

            The way to deal with drugs is from a scientific and psychosocial standpoint. Prohibition should not be the default for any substance. Study which produces scientific evidence is what needs to be used to define the classification of psychoactive substances. Not some protestant ideal that every person should be continually miserable for the duration of their entire lives.

            By all means, lock up heroin. But there's not rational reason to lock up marijuana or codeine (in small doses). By all means lock away glucose and fructose, but come for my coffee and there will be fucking blood in the gutters. I promise you that.

            With the exception of certain highly addictive substances - like heroin - mere availability does not lead people to abuse them. And if someone is driven to the point that they will abuse lightly psychoactive substances like marijuana, caffeine or small doses of codeine then those same people will find anything, like an aerosol can or gasoline fumes to abuse.

            The problems with those people is not substance availability. There is something in their lives driving them to abuse. And, quite frankly, I'd rather have people who are driven to abuse a substance getting smashed on stupid quantities of weed than I would having them fuck themselves up on gasoline or aerosol. I've seen what the latter does and it's not pretty.

            There are always going to be people who need to escape reality. They should have relatively safe options for doing so. Things - like marijuana - which can provide the escape, but don't fuck you up so completely that you will never be able to recover.

            It also frees up resources to go after things like heroin which absolutely are problems. To everyone. You don't need to "abuse" heroin. It is so addictive that primary exposure is enough.

            But that distinction seems lost on you. The concept that there are some substances - dextromethropan hydrobormide or loperamide, for example - that you need to actively abuse to truly fuck yourself up. These are substances which have beneficial effects at low to moderate doses, but which can be abused by dedicated individuals to be every bit as dangerous as heroin, if not more so.

            That class of substances - and here I place marijuana, caffiene and at the extreme edge of the classification, alcohol - should not be prohibited. The good they do far outweighs the harm. The majority of people can handle these substances without abuse, and it is our choice what we do with our own bodies and minds.

            That leaves a limited number of substances - like heroin - which need to be locked up for the public good. But there are not that many substances in this category.

            If you're truly a cop then you would do well to learn the above, internalize is and even champion it. Maybe - just maybe - if you weren't trying to create a police state so that you could "protect" us by keeping us all in fucking bubble wrap you'd find people hate you and yours less...and will even work with you to help create a better society.

            It is attitudes like yours that foster an "us" versus "them" attitude and lead to wasting hundreds of billions of dollars hunting down and incarcerating those who do no harm. All of which does nothing but pull precious resources away from hunting those who are doing harm.

            And for what? Your inability to understand science? Your unwillingness to see a differentiation or gradation in the effects of various substances? Your belief that that classification system of your corrupt government or the words of the religious leaders and corporations that control it can be trusted?

            You want to help society? Shut down the companies putting sugar and high-fructose corn syrup into everything we eat. Legalize marijuana. Force a mandatory review of all substances currently classified as restricted or banned with only hard science allowed to drive the new classification. Ban religious interference of any kind from government; their self-flagellating piousness should in no way affect how rational people run their lives.

            Until you're willing to work towards that, you're just an empty suit. The enforcement arm of a series of bad laws written by worse people for the express purpose not of helping the milled masses, but of making us live our lives according to the designs of those who cannot stand anything - or anyone - outside their control.

            1. Bilious

              Re: This is someone

              Opiates, whether morphine, codeine or heroin, are effective against pain and cough. The differences between them relate to the routes of intake and the number of milligrams needed for effect. But do you seriously think they are useful as recreational drugs?

              Cannabis, the natural stuff, is a mixture of active substances. Some of them have rather long half-lives. It seems that they are not as innocuous as the old hippies tell us. Long-term effects seem to be real.

              http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mentalhealthinformation/mentalhealthproblems/alcoholanddrugs/cannabisandmentalhealth.aspx

              It seems that serious people have investigated the matter and come to a conclusion. So - who should have access to opiates and cannabis?

              And how about amphetamines and cocaine?

              1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

                Re: This is someone

                Cannabis can affect people with certain mental disorders very badly. It doesn't affect the majority of people badly at all...unless you abuse it. This is where calibrating safe doses for the average person comes in, as well as proper labelling so that people who have certain conditions don't take it.

                Dextromethorpan is a cough supressant. Harmless at prescribed doses to the overwhelming majority of people and available as an over-the-counter substance. Yet if you combine it with an SSRI or SNRI ( or $deity help you, both, as in Effexor) then Very Bad Things can happen. In Canada, our pharmacists hand over the stuff, because they are told to look up your existing prescriptions to make sure there are no known interactions with your existing drugs. It is over the counter; there is nothing to stop them from selling it to you, but they do their jobs and the system works.

                Cannabis can be - and should be - handled the same way. (Actually, I argue that THC should be purified and offered as an inhalant, but that's another discussion for another day.) When used in moderation by normal people, cannabis is fine. It offers consequences no worse than a squillion other substances we take without question.

                Are there potential tradeoffs? Sure. Does that mean than an adult should not be allowed to make those choices for themselves? No. The tradeoffs of cannabis are far, far less likely to affect others than hundreds of other substances we all consume every day.

                In Canada, we do have over the counter access to codeine. Oddly enough, we aren't all stoned out of our minds 24/7, even though I promise you there's enough codeine in my house to get you fucking baked for an entire week. It seems that my nation is filled with people who can handle this particular opiate responsibly, and stick to low doses.

                That doesn't mean I advocate allowing heroin in the wild. It does mean that "all drugs are not the same" and that you need to open your mind a little.

                Amphetamines are another story altogether. They have a completely different effect on people with ADHD than those who don't. Significantly different brain chemistries means that we ADHD folks process the drugs differently and that we don't tend to get addicted to them, or experience the other very bizarre side effects that "normals" report.

                Does that mean amphetamines should be available over the counter? No...or, at least, not all of them. Very low doses of certain amphetamines could actually be a good thing. Better for "normal" people than hammering caffeine pills to get a pick me up. But only in low doses, and only certain amphetamines.

                The rest should be prescription only, handed out to those who have ADHD and carefully monitoring the patient to ensure that the diagnosis of ADHD is correct, and the drugs won't interact badly. There are probably a whole bunch of amphetamines that shouldn't be offered, even as prescriptions, because they interact badly with all individuals.

                And what about cocaine? It's certainly no heroin. Heroin is way, way more addictive and dangerous. Yet it becomes addictive at doses much lower than, for example, marijuana.

                Marijuana has to be consumed in such high doses to be addictive that you will experience other, far more negative effects long before you get to the point of addiction. If you are willing to live with those effects just stay high 24/7, you're already at the point that you're A) not normal and B) need institutional help.

                Cocaine can deliver addiction at doses low enough that you don't fuck yourself up completely. That said, it can also be used responsibly to deliver a mild high that is pleasant and non-addictive. So, should cocaine be banned? Or merely heavily regulated? It is the drug I don't have a quick answer for.

                Acetaminophen is far more dangerous to the average person than marijuana and probably more dangerous than cocaine, and yet acetaminophen is given out like ****ing candy. Ibuprofin doesn't come with big warning labels that say "abuse will cause stomach ulcers". And that's before we get into abuse of glucose, fructose or processed carbohydrates!

                If your problem with a substance is that people use it some of the time to feel good, then fuck you. Who the hell are you to tell me - or anyone else - how they can or can't feel, or how they may go about feeling that way?

                A ban on driving under the influence? By all means. That's sane, rational and matters because it affects other people. But if I want to sit in the comfort of my own home and get high, having planned my week around it so that I have nowhere to go and have an emergency taxi fund in case something does come up...who the hell are you to tell me no?

                Most people are perfectly capable of consuming mildly psychoactive substances responsibly.

                There are some substances so powerful that nobody can be considered capable of consuming responsibly.

                There are some people who will consume any substance irresponsibly.

                Out job, as citizens and as a society is to find a way to intervene as little as possible with the responsible consumption of mildly psychoactive substances as possible while helping those people who abuse any substance, no matter how powerful. It is also our job to rationally separate substances that can be consumed responsibly by the average person from those that can't.

                If you don't like that other people consume a substance they are capable of consuming responsibly then it is you right to voice your opinion in that regard. It isn't your right to force your beliefs and desires on others.

                Your rights end exactly at the point where they interfere with the rights of others. That's the hard part for puritans and control freaks to understand, and to live with.

                No substance should be banned unless it can be scientifically proven that the average person is incapable of consuming it responsibly. Period.

                More to the point, we need to offer help to those who find themselves unable to consume any substance responsibly. From cocaine to herion, from glucose to carbohydrates.

                Sadly, it seems that far too many people will rush to judgement for certain substances not based on logic, rationality or science...but because their belief system says that people should not experience joy or pleasure. That we should all work, suffer, experience misery and then die.

                Well, there is no god and there is no afterlife. So anyone who believes in that particular bit of fuckery can get bent. Life is what you make of it, and none of us should be dedicating ourselves to making others miserable. There's nothing wrong with a good joint now and again, when consumed responsibly...and I'll go to actual war if you come for my caffeine.

                You've been warned.

                1. Bilious

                  Re: This is someone

                  The problem is that there may be fuzzy borders between responsible and irresponsible use of substances. There can be no doubt that drug or alcohol addiction is a problem to the user, but much more to the surroundings. So there are arguments for restrictions on use and availability of recreational drugs in order to protect the innocent. Drug use is not a purely personal matter.

                  1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

                    Re: This is someone

                    "The problem is that there may be fuzzy borders between responsible and irresponsible use of substances. There can be no doubt that drug or alcohol addiction is a problem to the user, but much more to the surroundings. So there are arguments for restrictions on use and availability of recreational drugs in order to protect the innocent. Drug use is not a purely personal matter."

                    Bullshit. You equate use with addiction. You are wrong. Responsible use is where substance use occurs without addiction and without detrimental effects to others.

                    Responsible drug use absolutely is a personal matter, and your puritan philosophies will not change that.

        2. --. --- -..
          Pint

          Re: This is someone

          This is what the science says on the addictive qualities of marijuana ~~~

          "We were the people who reported on marijuana withdrawal. I know people don’t like to really hear that — the marijuana withdrawal story. It’s important to put this one in context. What we did was, we brought people into the lab who smoked every day — multiple joints a day — and then abruptly shut them off. And you could see marijuana withdrawal in some of them — not in all, but in some. With marijuana withdrawal, people’s sleep is disrupted; they don’t eat as much; they’re more irritable. It looks kind of like tobacco withdrawal or something like that. It’s gone in about four days, depending on the level of marijuana usage. When we think about marijuana withdrawal, it’s certainly not life-threatening, but it can be irritating. So when people say, “Well, you can’t possibly have withdrawal from marijuana” — well, people will have withdrawal from any drug that they’ve been using for an extended period of time. We get withdrawal from caffeine; it’s not a big deal, but it’s real."

          1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

            Re: This is someone

            Where did I say that marijuana was safe for everyone? Hmm? No chemical is. And yet, that doesn't mean you lock it up and away from everyone. It means you put your time and effort into education. Into making sure you can tailor drugs to the individual, etc.

            People with peanut allergies know to stay away from peanuts. People with certain genetics should know to stay away from marijuana. People on the schizophrenia spectrum need to know to stay way from amphetamines. People on the autism spectrum need to stay away from antipsychotics.

            We are all different, and it is up to the individual to know their own selves; what they can tolerate, and what they can't. We can test for this stuff now. It's not that hard. I mean, hell, you need to get a blood pressure test before getting birth control pills, why the hell can't we mandate a genetics test before being cleared for marijuana/amphetamines/etc.

            There are a huge number of drugs withheld from the market that could do real good in the world. These are drugs that could change the quality of life for tens of millions of people, but are held back because less than 1% of people would experience serious negative side effects.

            This is stupid, wasteful and harmful to anyone with an IQ bigger than their shoe size. Those drugs can not only improve life for people, in many cases they can save lives.

            But no, they're locked away from everyone because of shortsighted fearmongers who are terrified that they will get into the hands of the less than 1% of people they would truly harm. Any attempts to work out a middle ground - for example, make those drugs prescription only, put money into developing commoditized test to ensure that taking that drug is okay, etc - are stamped out in furious anger by the fearmongers.

            Troglodytes. Troglodytes that care nothing for the suffering of others so long as it allows them to impose their narrow, limited worldview on everyone else. I hope each and every one of them suffers greatly from a perfectly preventable illness before dying a miserably, lingering, horribly painful death. One that a drug withheld because of fear of how it would affect less than 1% of people could have mitigated or cured.

      2. Boork!

        Re: This is someone

        Heroin and cocaine used to be the vices of a small minority. Making them illegal drove the prices up and created incentives for organized crime to get involved and to increase their takings by getting many more people hooked.

      3. --. --- -..

        Re: This is someone

        Well according to award winning Princeton scientist Dr Carl Hart, you'r wrong. And you can read all about your wrongness here. http://www.drcarlhart.com/

  5. btrower

    Ends do not justify the means

    This is a battle between criminals on both sides. If you look into the injury to civil liberties necessary to do this, it is not worth it. In order to catch a few criminals and take down $1 million in ill-gotten gains, we have spent something on the order of $100 billion dollars or more (annually!) of taxpayer's money and sacrificed civil liberties that many people have literally given their lives to secure.

    Tor is a pretty good idea unless you are attempting to use it to skate by the National Security State(s). Then, it is hopelessly inadequate as can be seen by the fact that it failed in its one task to maintain privacy.

    If you drop bombs on everyone in a ten block radius in downtown NYC you will no doubt get a few nasty culprits who had it coming. You will no doubt save a few lives by knocking out people who would have gone on to murder. However, you do that at the unacceptable expense of murdering tens of thousands of innocents. It is like murdering prospective parents to achieve birth control. The goal is achieved, but not at a cost that makes any sense.

    The current state of affairs fosters a corrupt criminal law enforcement establishment that is well out of control. It is systematically destroying the rule of law. It is, in essence, replacing a class of petty criminals who work outside the law, create murder and mayhem and steal millions of dollars from other criminals with a much more dangerous class of criminals who destroy the rule of law entirely, kidnap and torture people and steal trillions of dollars from you and me.

    We can deal with the first type of criminals without destroying civil liberties. A few may get away, but we can keep the overall damage bearable. The second type of criminals represent a permanent threat to everything we hold dear. They are paving the road to slavery of a sort unbelievably cruel and impossible to escape.

    The same security establishment crowing about this trivial bust has been instrumental in extraordinary rendition and torture and the methods used are essentially the same.

    On the upside, these weasels have revealed themselves and maybe we can take names for later prosecution.

    1. Looper

      Re: Ends do not justify the means

      Nicely said.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    And yet...

    the banking criminals still walk free.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: And yet...

      "the banking criminals still walk free."

      Why do you bring RBS GRG into a debate about TOR? Admittedly Cable knows, Osborne knows, the opposition know.....and still do nothing, the press pussy foot knowing that the Establishment are in Cahoutts with the wrongdoers, and in the meanwhile the crims work to shred the evidence. CoLP, they know, but the politicians don't want to rake too much muck in the City.

      Y'see, even though Bazulgette built the sewers big, some turds were just too big to flush.

  7. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Meh

    Smug Much?

    Does this person seriously believe this is anything more than a 'business expense' to the crim bosses?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Smug Much?

      Yes, losing $1M (in Bitcoins or anything) might blow out a mid-level drug dealer, but its not going to stop any serious criminal enterprise.

      Still, it makes good copy for Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Public, wondering where their taxes are going.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Meh

    But I am betting...

    That even after infiltrating the encrypted TOR darknet, law enforcement officials will still weep about things like Applie and Google rolling out default mobile device data encryption....

  9. Mage Silver badge

    But

    More sensible than stupid ISP blocking ...

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    IF these law enforcement agents have cracked Tor, it is safe to say the the NSA and it European counterparts have cracked Tor also. Pretty soon repressive governments everywhere will be able to crack Tor. RIP Tor.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "it's understood not all the sites were active – some were spare servers, redirects or just empty"

    So they went through the Silk Road guy's bookmarks then?

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A minor setback, if that.

    I can forsee a two-tier system, the usual ToR for simple browsing as now, because there's no harm in looking, then load up a txt file with product codes like barcodes, requested quantities, and delivery details, PGP that sucker good and proper and transmit to the vendor via a slow but super secure darknet system. It's only a txt file after all. There are already things like bitcoin fog, darkcoin and other such things to facilitate multi-sig escrow payments.

    Just my thoughts, though I would recommend a legalising Cannabis and having "shooting galleries" and the like for harder drugs, with the proceeds going to treatment programs. I can't see that happening here any time soon what with Camoron's recently reaffirmed alliegence to the existing drug cartels of breweries and big pharma.

    Personally (hence anon) I just got grassed and busted for about 20 personal medicinal plants that I planned to process in to nice civilised concentrates (oils, hash, e-juice etc. so no smelly joints) and now back on the special brew for the stress costing an already strained to breaking point NHS untold money. Now I can talk about it I've got job offers flooding in. Well done prohibition!

    Finally, I cannot recommend the following documentary enough: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/culturehigh/107375127

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Really?

    You've got to be pretty damn stupid or in drug induced denial to not know that you can't hide if authorities want to find and prosecute you for your crimes. I hope they rot in prison.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Really?

      You're cute, but oblivious.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    MilInd complex

    "Among the 414 websites shut down were those selling weapons and drugs, and advertising contract killers"

    So they shut down government websites?

    1. Will Godfrey Silver badge

      Re: MilInd complex

      But in fact 207 sites were doing nothing unlawful at all, and 195 were only engaged in copyright infringement.

  15. Random Q Hacker

    No need for drug laws or any other nanny state laws

    A person's body and what they do with it should be a sacred protected right. Only when it comes to crime against others should there be intervention. I don't care about all the students tweaking on meth to get their studying done, just the one that steals my car stereo. Have criminal intervention for the crime committed, but not for the mere fact of using. That needs medical and counseling intervention.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: No need for drug laws or any other nanny state laws

      But what happens when the meth-head goes on a suicide rampage and takes many innocent lives with him? Or the drunk who ghost drives and kills a family and himself? Can't punish the perp since he's dead, so it's kinda too late, you know? People don't live in isolation; we're a SOCIETY, so anything we do can have consequences for others even if we don't realize it.

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