Alpha Bay Down, With Rumours of Law Enforcement and Suicides Circulating! Does Anyone Know the Truth?
Sharp Exit or Genuinely Down?
Since July 4th, the most popular dark net market, Alpha Bay, has been offline after what rumours have claimed to be a combined international law enforcement effort lead by the U.S. involving the arrest of Alpha Bay operator Alexandre Cazes in Thailand, who was found the next day dead in his cell from apparent suicide.
Alpha Bay was an online dark net market running on the Tor network, which went online in 2013 after the demise of Silk Road. Users were able to purchase weapons, drugs, stolen credit card details, and much more using Bitcoin and popular privacy-based altcoin Monero as the two native currencies on the site.
Users have been keeping up to date on the status of Alpha Bay and other dark net markets using DNStats.net.
Rumours and Confusion!
Days following July 4th, before the apparent news of authorities mobilizing on Alpha Bay, many thought the site owners had abruptly exited (many still do!), triggering rage across the Internet, especially on Reddit!
For some, Alpha Bay was the go-to site to purchase products, leading to many keeping large quantities of Bitcoin and Monero on their Alpha Bay escrow account. With the harsh reality of Alpha Bay supposedly never returning, many dark markets, such as HANSA, are now experiencing an influx of users that are now dubbed "Alpha Bay refugees."
However, the rumours haven't stopped, and some users on Reddit aren't buying the story about the international authorities stepping in. Instead, they are speculating on possible contingencies…
Until official representatives of U.S., Canada, or Thailand's authorities make an official statement, all we have are rumours, theories, and angry users who have lost their bitcoins. The timing of this potential exit couldn't be at a worse time, as the cryptocurrency community is full of uncertainty regarding Bitcoin's SegWit activation on August 1st.
If this is a carefully thought out exit plan, the reputation of Bitcoin could be set back years. Many are already comparing this to the shutdown of Silk Road.
We will keep you updated on any further news on this as it develops in the coming weeks!
Cryptocurrency prices will tank because of this and the Bitcoin fork. I'm going to load up as much as possible in this period.
I don't really understand the end game of the international police force that took down Alphabay. Alphabay users will just move to another market, that market will probably be shut down in a year and the process will repeat. There are literally hundreds of reliable markets.
As long as you are careful to use good security (PGP etc.) and don't tie up too much capital in your account there is no great risk.
It wouldn't be that hard to fake your death with that kind of money, especially when there are corrupt cops involved (very likely). He could be sipping MaiTais and eating shrimp tacos in Vietnam by now!
This is all over the news here in Thailand and not one person supports the story of a towel hanging on any comment section I see.
An interesting feature to this story is that a woman was in the cell next door and is a reliable witness who heard and confirms that nothing and no one made a sound while this happened.
Since when are men and women held together while incarcerated? And of course the timing is very fortuitous for some people.
Let's remember Evolution market exit scam, owners disapeared with 40'000 BTC! I think here is same story, owners realased that sooner or later they will get cought and disapeared with all bank before it happens! Good way to become a millionaire in couple years! :)
its a sham
According to my neighbors' brother...that was just over for a barbeque, the US office of Homeland Security was involved. He's an Ice Agent and his office was supporting their Internet Crimes division with the crack down. 😬
He's a decent guy, but has been brainwashed to think all cryptos are bad. Still interesting to talk to about it though.
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Excelente, igual yo leo algo diferente. La culpa la tiene Alphabet Inc por lo desorganizado que es con sus lados oscuros
I don't think this will have an effect on bitcoin because honest bitcoin traders on honest exchange will not panic from this. Also I'm glad that finally this dark web site is closed. Millions of people had their cc and id's traded on that site. So it's good that all operators of such sites should panic.
I gotta be honest, I'm experiencing outrage, but not knowing at whom or why diminishes the flavor. I just write things for hacker money.
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