When Anthony begins his career as a forger, in 2020, he quickly encounters a big problem. At the time, this security expert from a large arms manufacturer was unable to attract enough customers to the stores he opened on the French-speaking forums of the dark web. Their names are evocative: “Le Monde Parallèle”, “Dark French Anti System” or even “Criminality French Market”. But they hardly make a profit. “The dark web is dying,” we whisper to this young man in his twenties who looks like a good student who lives near Belfort. A problem that he will resolve quickly.
Anthony, alias “Volrys” online, migrates to Telegram, the popular instant messaging service of Russian origin from the Durov brothers based today in Dubai. Good pick. After offering fake proof of address for 5 euros to lure customers, his store selling fake national identity cards receives up to ten requests per day. The success was such that this genius of false papers – he was considered the most active forger in France – had to automate the application process and recruit a friend, a local apprentice baker who was struggling. A success story criminal brutally stopped by the police, several months after the fall of La Geneverie, another shady channel of which he was one of the suppliers. At the beginning of March, the engineer found himself with seven other defendants before the Parisian judges of the 13th criminal chamber. An unprecedented trial of black markets hosted on Telegram before the court, welcomed the public prosecutor.
A case also revealing an underlying trend: instant messaging such as Telegram or WhatsApp and social networks such as Snapchat or Instagram have made dark web black markets outdated in recent years. This somewhat sensational concept refers to illicit content accessible via darknets, networks superimposed on the Internet which integrate anonymization functions. Networks which must not be reduced to the shady trafficking that they enable: they are also essential to dissidents who live in authoritarian regimes. But in the 2010s, in their heyday, the dark web black markets gave public authorities a cold sweat. It was the time of the emergence of veritable drug and crime supermarkets like Silk Road, accessible in just a few clicks.
“All exit scams”
“At the beginning, the security services were a little overwhelmed,” points out Jean-Philippe Rennard, the author of “Darknet: myths and realities”. Delays that did not last. “They are now able to fight against this type of site,” continues the professor at Grenoble Ecole de Management. Their last major catch? Hydra Market in spring 2022. Beyond the legal blows, these drug Amazons have also lost the trust of their users through exit scams. This term refers to the unexpected closure of a black market by its administrator, which then evaporates with the funds deposited as security by sellers and buyers. “These are all exit scams,” Brett Johnson even insisted recently on LinkedIn. “The only question is whether the police will arrest the administrators before they can do so,” added this former administrator of a pioneering site of the genre opened in the early 2000s.
This outmoded nature of the dark web’s black markets is first and foremost a reflection of the evolution of the web itself. Whether it is dark or not… “There is no longer a single large web, but fragmented spaces,” recalls Olivier Ertzscheid, teacher-researcher in information and communication sciences at the University of Nantes. An archipelago driven by social networks, these applications which are no longer dedicated to a single use. These platforms have in fact become hybrid spaces, both messaging and social spaces. We can thus find on Telegram the information that we previously looked for on the web. And you just need to have an account to explore public channels without being part of them: we are far from private correspondence. “Social networks have not killed the dark web, but we see that there are shifting and generational effects,” summarizes Olivier Ertzscheid.
Ten grams of cannabis on Snapchat
The success of illicit offers on social networks is primarily due to their popularity and comfort. “If you order ten grams of cannabis on Snapchat, it will be delivered to your door, whereas with an online supermarket, it will go through the Post Office,” notes Jean-Philippe Rennard. This development is indeed palpable in the trafficking of psychotropic drugs. At the beginning of January, the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin had also raised his voice against “Uber shit”, these sales of drugs on social networks then delivered to homes. Easily accessible traffic. Simply search by keyword to discover a rich offering and activate location-related features, such as on Telegram, to identify sellers near you. With the key being a much larger potential market than that of the dark web, with a fairly confidential audience.
The specialist Aleph-Networks, the French “Google” of the dark web, estimates the number of French-speaking sites at around 700. Not everyone is ready to install the Tor browser, essential for accessing .onion sites on the dark web. Black markets also require mastery of cryptocurrencies. Finally, you often have to show your credentials with your PGP encryption key, a way of proving that you are who you say you are. For those who want to buy credit card numbers or narcotics, this can be “an obstacle”, notes Ivan Kwiatkowski, a computer security researcher at the cybersecurity company HarfangLab.
Although outdated, shady dark web traffic is not dead. “There is still very strong growth in the number of sites, assures Nicolas Hernandez, president of Aleph-Network. If social networks are an exit point, having a static website in the dark offers these criminals a foothold for their illicit activities.” Most ransomware gangs, the number one cybercriminal threat of the moment, use this type of site to distribute their stolen data.
“Easier platforms for police to monitor”
Black markets dedicated to “carding”, i.e. the sale of bank card numbers, are found more on Telegram, in particular via automatic accounts which broadcast extracts of stolen data. “But it’s not a postponement, rather an extension,” nuance Ivan Kwiatkowski. Cybercriminals have no real interest in “going to less secure networks,” he points out. Certainly, these platforms sometimes offer encryption functionalities for their exchanges. But they remain, whatever anyone says, less opaque than the dark web. For example, you must provide a telephone number, even temporary, to register on Telegram. “If there are a whole bunch of tools to register anonymously on a social network, from a technical point of view this has nothing to do with the offer proposed by darknets”, recalls Jean-Philippe Rennard . “In the end, these are easier platforms for the police to monitor,” even assures Ivan Kwiatkowski.
An analysis far from being shared by the public authorities. In the police, we complain about these platforms like Snapchat or Telegram which never respond to legal requests. Same observation for lawyer Eric Le Quellenec, of the Simmons & Simmons law firm, who intervenes in counterfeiting or e-reputation cases. “The platforms tell us that they are studying the file, then they take us from one service to another to save time, before finally explaining that they cannot respond with regard to the right to freedom of expression or private correspondence”, he summarizes. “We expect a lot from European regulations, such as the DSA (Digital Services Act) and the DMA (Digital Market Act) to combat this type of propagation of illicit content,” specifies the lawyer. A few months ago, members of the Higher Digital and Postal Commission, a parliamentary body, tried in vain to bring these applications within the scope of the bill aimed at securing and regulating the digital space. . “We must find the narrow path so as not to violate our fundamental rights while adapting our laws to make these messaging systems responsible,” MP Mireille Clapot hopes today. Even if it means doing without them in the meantime. The counterfeiter “Volrys” was thus identified after a long and patient investigation. The judgment in his case will be rendered on April 5.
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