No similar site will ever be created and all the resources formerly spent fighting drugs will be returned to improving the lives of citizens.
This is as great a sign of success as when we victoriously proclaimed "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq, and as assuredly as we have had peace since then in Iraq, we can look forward to as peaceful and drug-free an existence as when we enjoyed the peaceful, law-abiding, alcohol-free times of Prohibition.
Resources well-spent. We can finally sleep well tonight under the FBI's benevolent watch.
Irony would be that there is a news tomorrow to the effect " Half a dozen new web sites sprung up after Silk road bust and FBI is struggling this time to catch the perpetrators. They wised up from Silk Road's mistakes described in detail by FBI"
Nope, I meant irony. The word has multiple definitions. In its most popular - "the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect" - sarcasm is given as a synonym.
We will find you. If you are high enough profile, and your crime happens to match the current set of prosecutorial priorities laid down by the administration, justice dept., etc., then we will find you. With reasonably high probability.
> users migrate to other, smaller but similar anonymous black markets
Not only will they find you, the FBI has clearly put an end to the online drug trade.
> > users migrate to other, smaller but similar anonymous black markets
They're not going to be very happy about it, though. They were on SR for a reason. With Atlantis shuttering the other week, that leaves just BMR (old, but full of scammers) and Sheep (less than a year old and tiny).
Nobody in California was happy when their favorite dispensery got raided 8 years ago and there weren't many alternatives. But there is 3 per block in Los Angeles these days.
Despite the fact that raids were continuously happening, local governments were enacting bans (meaning immediate financial ruin) and certain dispensary owners were facing decades in prison...I'm not sure what the legality of the situation has to do with either of our points. The size and scope of alternatives is directly related to the success of the primary institution. The users will certainly not be happy about the situation, but barring major developments in the coming weeks, it is clear that operators and users have decided the risks are acceptable comparable to the service. Pointing to the landscape of alternative services at the present moment does not indicate how users will migrate and how site owners will propagate in the face of opportunity. The California industry is comparable as operators, while facing smaller penal punishment, faced the same financial risk and zero anonymity.
Yeah, I know what the FBI does, they are the people who pick through your trash in those big blue trucks. IIRC correctly they also invented the vaccum cleaner in the 50s because the director was getting his dress dirty cleaning the old fashioned way.
Every single high-level FBI bust is always about the operator doing something really simple and dumb, then the FBI puffs its chest and acts all powerful.
Like that article about the guy trying to extort poker players. The FBI agent admits she always wanted to be like they were on the TV show "CHiPS" and how they've got the hardest cybersquad available and will break you so better just 'fess up. In reality? Guy logged into his Gmail account from his house, and proceeded to blackmail via email. I mean, come on. Asking Google for an IP is now badass? Yet from the reading, hoo boy do they like busting down doors with guns out as if it was some criminal overload's lair.
As far as DPR, there's most definitely more than what's in the complaint. They got an image of the server but don't mention how. Now, it might have been something super easy (external IP leak due to shitty PHP code or webserver config followed by a subpoena), or it could have been Tor hidden service analysis. Bottom line is that he reused a handle and linked it to his real ID, didn't use Tor to access his box, etc.
On the story I linked, it was literally a case of "Hey Gmail, which IPs used this account? Thanks. Hey Comcast, which subscriber is <IP>? Cool, locked and loaded!"
I'm not sure how "hard" this work is when you're the federal government and can compel everyone to cooperate with you.
Hubris has a place. Studies have found that swiftness/certainty of capture and punishment are far more effective at deterring crime than harshness of punishment.
A message like, "We will catch you" isn't just about going on some power trip. It's a preemptive PR play.
The FBI press releases might be PR. Agents' actions (not just FBI, but local police to federal) from personal and other experience (where there's no publicity) seem to indicate a lot of them simply get off on the power.
The intimidation is also used in personal confrontation to try to get the suspect to drop their rights and not wait for a lawyer or stay silent. That's why they love busting in with guns and telling you how much they know and how you better not "piss them off".
It's one of my shortcomings that I just cannot get into the mindset of an FBI agent who is happy about this. How do you keep wanting to go to work and investigating this kind of thing?
Regardless of the pros/cons of the war on drugs, I can definitely see why this would be super fun to work on as an investigator. It's an incredibly complex problem to identify someone who is using all available technology to remain anonymous. And once you actually found them, I imagine that you'd be pretty excited about it.
Because you're a law enforcement officer, and it's the law?
Sure, it's a dumb law, but if you choose a career as a LEO you're not signing up to decide what the laws are. That's the legislature's job. Your job is to enforce the dumb ones along with the smart ones.
It's like the scene at the end of The Untouchables, after we've watched Eliot Ness throw everything he has into fighting bootleggers for two hours. Someone runs up to him waving a newspaper announcing that Prohibition has been repealed and asks him what he's going to do now. And he looks at the paper and replies "I'm going to have a drink."
The article has been edited since it was originally posted. The paragraph in question now reads:
> “This is supposed to be some invisible black market bazaar. We made it visible,” says an FBI spokesperson, who asked not to be named. “When you interviewed [Ulbricht], he said he would never be arrested. But no one is beyond the reach of the FBI. We will find you.”
More like "You can't make much more than 80MM resisting the FBI while living a normal, above-ground life within the United States, unless you avoid associating your real name with your criminal-conspiracy-in-development on a public messageboard."
The stasi are generally consider 'secret police' and they were also official acknowledged by the state. I've always understood secret police to refer to the methods rather than official acknowledgement of their existence.
At last the drug war has been won!
No similar site will ever be created and all the resources formerly spent fighting drugs will be returned to improving the lives of citizens.
This is as great a sign of success as when we victoriously proclaimed "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq, and as assuredly as we have had peace since then in Iraq, we can look forward to as peaceful and drug-free an existence as when we enjoyed the peaceful, law-abiding, alcohol-free times of Prohibition.
Resources well-spent. We can finally sleep well tonight under the FBI's benevolent watch.