Dismantling of the world's "largest" darknet platform

The "largest" site for the sale of drugs, false papers or even counterfeit money, hosted on the Darknet, has been dismantled and its alleged manager arrested, the prosecutor's office in Koblenz, Germany, announced on Tuesday.

The alleged operator of "DarkMarket", presented by investigators as the "largest" point of sale in the world, a 34-year-old Australian, was arrested this weekend at the German-Danish border, said the prosecution in a communicated.

He was remanded in custody. 

"More than 20 servers in Moldova and Ukraine" were also seized, adds the prosecution, which carried out its investigations for "months" with the police of the central service of criminal investigations of Oldenburg.

Police from several countries, such as the United States, Great Britain, Denmark, Moldova and Ukraine, have also been called upon.

"The sale of drugs of all kinds" 

The platform was dismantled Monday after the shutdown of the servers, according to the Koblenz prosecutor's office.

For investigators, DarkMarket was "arguably the world's largest Darknet marketplace, with nearly 500,000 users and more than 2,400 sellers."

"In total, at least 320,000 transactions have been carried out there," settled in Bitcoin and Monero cryptocurrencies.

Their total amount could rise, according to the Koblenz prosecutor's office, to 140 million euros.

This platform was "mainly used for the sale of drugs of all kinds," said the prosecution.

"Counterfeit money, stolen or falsified credit card data, anonymous SIM cards" and even computer viruses were also on sale.

The data entered must now allow, warns the prosecution, to open new avenues of investigations towards resellers, moderators and customers.