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tdubz



Registered: 02/26/12
Posts: 5,586
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How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring
#23752905 - 10/19/16 07:10 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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https://motherboard.vice.com/read/how-belgian-romanian-french-and-us-cops-took-down-an-alleged-dark-web-ring
The dark web allows people to deal drugs from wherever they happen to be based. Although not necessarily a global phenomenon, the dark web drug trade is very much international in scope, with vendors on both sides of the Atlantic, and further afield, stocking digital shelves with cocaine, heroin, and a plethora of other drugs.
Bearing that cross-border relationship in mind, one recent series of arrests shows law enforcement’s coordinated response, with Belgian, Romanian, French, and US authorities all working in tandem on a complex investigation to take down alleged members of a dark web ecstasy ring.
On Monday, the US Attorney's Office in the District of Colorado announced the extradition of Filip Lucian Simion, 23, from Romania to Denver. Simion is allegedly the leader of “ItalianMafiaBrussells,” or “IMB,” which primarily exported MDMA to the US and Canada. But the investigation into IMB started way back on the original Silk Road marketplace.
On June 14, 2013, US Customs and Border Protection intercepted over 60 grams of MDMA sent from Belgium and addressed to an individual in Boulder, Colorado, according to a court document. The intended recipient agreed to cooperate with law enforcement when confronted by a local task force, and told investigators he had ordered the drugs from IMB.
Authorities seized other packages for US-based customers too, including at JFK airport in New York City, and got them to inform on their supplier. Some suspects then gave investigators access to their dark web marketplace accounts, and as a result, their messages with IMB.
Silk Road product reviews helped connect confidential informants to IMB. Meanwhile, Belgian law enforcement intercepted other IMB packages between February and September 2014. These packages contained fake invoices claiming to be from real businesses, likely included to give the packages an air of legitimacy. In all, Belgian police intercepted 19 parcels they believed to come from the same person or organisation, and told US law enforcement about the seizures.
In return, Belgian authorities were provided with data from the server of Silk Road, which included private communications between IMB and their customers. Whoever was behind the IMB account was fluent in Dutch and English, talked about Romania, and seemed to be familiar with the Belgian Federal Judicial Police (Federale Gerechtelijke Politie, or FGP). In messages, IMB also claimed to be living near Brussels.
But in a seemingly unrelated investigation, the FGP had already searched a house and storage garage belonging to Simion in December 2013. It’s not clear what spurred on this drug search in the first place, but investigators found mailing labels, presumably for Simion’s suspected customers. Several of those names matched customers US authorities had flipped, and Belgian investigators found records related to the fake invoices: Simion was now linked to the dark web parcels.
Armed with all this information, the FGP and the Romanian Federal Police began physical surveillance of Simion and his apparent associates. With telephone wiretaps, the FGP found the gang was using encrypted messaging apps for texts and calls, including RedPhone.
“Based on this, coupled with activities observed by police on surveillance, the FGP believes that the members of the organization primarily use internet communication apps and encrypted email for substantive communications,” a court document reads. In one case when the group weren’t using encryption, the FGP says it heard someone cutting or preparing drugs in the background of a call, as well as typing on a computer.
Authorities determined that Simion and Leonardo Cristea, another alleged member, lived in Bucharest, Romania, while suspected associates Andy Nestor and Yman Djavatkhanov were based in Bruges, and would make trips to the border areas of France and Germany. Just to make the whole thing even more complicated, French police also intercepted dozens of parcels bound for the US, including one that had been ordered by an undercover Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent in Chicago.
The FGP bugged a garage in Bruges that the group had been using, and recorded them talking about their business in detail.
In May, the culmination of these distant law enforcement agencies came together: 10 defendants were arrested as part of the joint US/European law enforcement action. Simion and Cristea face a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
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Ellis Dee
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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: tdubz] 1
#23753138 - 10/19/16 08:27 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
tdubz said:In one case when the group weren’t using encryption, the FGP says...
They got lazy with security and their laziness got them captured.
-------------------- "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do."-King Solomon And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
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my3rdeye



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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: Ellis Dee] 2
#23753881 - 10/20/16 02:16 AM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Quote:
Ellis Dee said:
Quote:
tdubz said:In one case when the group weren’t using encryption, the FGP says...
They got lazy with security and their laziness got them captured.

That is not what the article says, it says the house was searched as a result of another investigation. What good is encrypyted communications when several customers flipped and gave police access to their accounts?
"But in a seemingly unrelated investigation, the FGP had already searched a house and storage garage belonging to Simion in December 2013. It’s not clear what spurred on this drug search in the first place, but investigators found mailing labels, presumably for Simion’s suspected customers. Several of those names matched customers US authorities had flipped, and Belgian investigators found records related to the fake invoices: Simion was now linked to the dark web parcels"
If you have a mail order operation running out of your house you shouldn't be doing other shit to attract attention, if they just sold drugs online the local police would not have caught them. If you do this shit you don't deal real life, you don't have domestic disputes with your wife, you don't have a teenage son out committing break ins in the neighborhood. You live clean. Don't even have parties or crank your music. There should never be anything leading police back to your stash house. They did something wrong to bring attention to them, but I disagree that lack of encryption did them in. The phone calls are evidence to convict them but it doesn't seem like that is what got them caught.
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Vitalux
Stranger from the next universe



Registered: 02/15/11
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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: tdubz]
#23755826 - 10/20/16 07:10 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Rats
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fapjack
Title



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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: tdubz]
#23758804 - 10/21/16 06:31 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Dark net markets give you extra anonymity at the price of notoriety. If you want to sell drugs online to people in the US on a large scale expect the DEA to come looking for you. If this vendor wasn't selling shit in the US they wouldn't have been able to connect the dots.
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Vitalux
Stranger from the next universe



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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: fapjack]
#23777444 - 10/27/16 04:50 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Cops could not even solve a cross word puzzle with out a rat giving them the answers.
Human nature is to rat out eat other ....It is the nature of the human rat race.
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5150
phantom

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Re: How Cops From Four Countries Busted a Dark Web Drug Ring [Re: Vitalux]
#23780075 - 10/28/16 01:37 PM (7 years, 3 months ago) |
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Have known a few bulgarians,shady fuckers
-------------------- "the way of the warrior is the resolute acceptance of death" Miyamoto Musashi
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