Assignment: Cyber
Crime
By: Clémence Robineau
The
FBI has shut down an alleged online drug marketplace, known as “Silk Road”.
This
anonymous haven for illegal drugs like heroin, cocaine, and criminal activities
such as murder for hire has seen its alleged owner, Ross William Ulbricht, get
arrested and his bail hearing is set for this Friday, October 4th 2013.
"Silk
Road has emerged as the most sophisticated and extensive criminal marketplace
on the Internet today," FBI agent Christopher Tarbell said in the criminal
complaint. This site has sold over hundreds of kilograms of illegal drugs and
also shared tutorials on hacking ATM machines and provided contact lists for
black market connections and counterfeiters. The website worked with the
digital currency Bitcoin and the sales generated by Silk Road were worth more
than 9.5 billion bitcoin, which is about $1.2 billion.
This
online disinhibition effect that Ross William Ulbricht went through can be
viewed as “dissociative anonymity”. According to his parents, Ross was a
stellar student who graduated from UPenn with a master’s in material sciences,
but according to his alias Dread Pirate Roberts, Ross was a worldwide drug
dealer and computer hacker. His anonymity on the Internet led him to conduct
this grand scheme that paralyzed the drug world into World Wide Web frenzy
where anyone could illegally buy drugs from the comfort of their own home. Ross
William Ulbricht even admitted to it himself when speaking with another user: “Especially
here on Silk Road, anonymity is sacrosanct."
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