Silk Road was an e-commerce site accessible only through the hidden services of the Tor anonymity software. The products were sold on Silk Road were classified as contraband products by the majority of the world's jurisdictions. Silk Road has been defined as "the Amazon of drugs."
On the October 3, 2013 Silk Road was overshadowed by the FBI. In early November it was announced the reopening on the part of the site administrator, who signed with the pseudonym Dread Pirate Roberts, although the FBI had arrested the person who according to them was hidden behind the nickname.
On the November 6, 2014, this second version of the Silk Road was closed by the FBI and removed from the network. Just two hours later, appeared Silk Road 3.0
On the May 30, 2015 Ross Ulbricht, the maker of Silk Road and the site administrator with the pseudonym "Dread Pirate Roberts", was sentenced in first instance to life imprisonment for the offenses of criminal conspiracy, computer fraud, distribution of false identities, recycling of money, drug trafficking, drug trafficking and conspiracy to traffic on the internet drugs. Ulbricht had been arrested thanks to FBI agents infiltrated under cover in its platform, and it was later said sorry for the consequences of his actions.
All site transactions occurred using bitcoin, the electronic money that allows you to receive or make payments in total anonymity. To cope with possible fluctuations in bitcoin exchange rate, which can be considerable also in short periods, the prices charged on Silk Road are tied to the US dollar, in order to prevent deflation or inflations too drastic. Users not interested in selling can sign up for free Silk Road; this policy is designed to reduce the possibility for unauthorized users to distribute contaminated products. Since its launch in February 2011, after three months of development, was outlined clearly the business genre that wanted to assert Silk Road: drugs, pornography, fake products, fake documents and, as of March 2012, also weapons contraband. However, the site administrators have banned the sale of goods or services intended to harm others. The sellers operate mainly in the United States and Great Britain, offering mostly products such as MDMA, heroin, LSD and cannabis. A site manager said that "over 99% of all transactions carried out within the system with the guarantee deposit, has been completed to the satisfaction of the buyer and seller, or otherwise - in the event of complaints - at the end of an agreement it was always achieved. "
On the 2 October 2013, the FBI arrested the site owner, Ross Ulbricht, in California. The site was taken offline. The FBI also seized $ 3.6 million Bitcoin held by Ulbricht. The federal court in New York, which in February had considered the original thirty-one of Texas guilty to all seven counts of the indictment against him (among them drug trafficking on the internet, conspiracy to traffic drugs, money laundering), It sentenced him to life imprisonment May 30, 2015.
Following an article in the blog Gawker, US Senators Charles Schumer and Joe Manchin sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and the administrator of the DEA Michele Leonhart to demand the closure of the Silk Road.
In a press conference Schumer described the site as follows:
"This is clearly a one-stop shop for illegal drugs, which represents the most blatant attempt to sell drugs online that we have ever seen. You cheeky light years more than anything else. »
Subsequently, the Silk Road administrators have posted on their forum this response:
"The die was cast, and now we will see what will come out. We will intensify efforts to counter their attacks and make the strongest possible site, this means that for a while 'we will be less sensitive to messages that concern us.
I'm sure that this news will scare anyone, but we have to win the battle, a new era will be born. Even if we lose, the genie is out of the bottle; They are fighting a war unwinnable. »
After these events, the traffic on the site has grown tremendously and the bitcoin has undergone a substantial increase in value.
During the legislative discussion of the Stop Online Piracy Act of 2011, the site was also used as an example of the evolution of some distributed network websites, and computer systems which, by their structure, are not locked by filtering the name of domain.
January 13, 2015 online appears the new Silk Road.
Compared to the first version, it can be accessed via the I2p software and not with the Tor browser. In addition, for trade, as well as bitcoins are accepted eight other crypto-currencies. The site operators earn a percentage of each sale and also this new version on each conversion of the new currency in bitcoin.
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