The FBI claimed it found Incognito Market’s alleged owner, Rui-Siang Lin, by tracking crypto from the dark web drug market to a crypto exchange account allegedly in his name.
A 23-year-old man has been arrested in New York and charged with owning, running and profiting from a $100-million dark web narcotics marketplace after authorities claimed to have tracked crypto transfers that uncovered his real identity.
Rui-Siang Lin, known online as “Pharoah,” was arrested at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport on May 18 and appeared in federal court on Monday, May 20, the Manhattan United States Attorney’s Office wrote in a statement.
“For nearly four years, Rui-Siang Lin allegedly operated ‘Incognito Market,’ one of the largest online platforms for narcotics sales, conducting $100 million in illicit narcotics transactions and reaping millions of dollars in personal profits,” added Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Assistant Director in Charge James Smith.
Incognito Market was an onion-based e-commerce platform accessed using the Tor web browser, referred to as the “dark web” or “dark net.”
It allowed users to buy and sell drugs, including cocaine, LSD, MDMA and prescription amphetamines, such as Adderall, using Bitcoin
BTC
tickers down
$61,050
and Monero
XMR
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$151
as payment methods.