Darknet and Cybercrime Roundup

Alphabay Vendor ‘EtiKing’ Sentenced to Life in Prison
Jeremy P. Achey, known to some as the Alphabay vendor ”EtiKing,” faced U.S. District Judge Paul Byron in a recent sentencing hearing. Earlier this year, a jury convicted Achey of controlled substance distribution and fentanyl distribution. His drug sales led to the overdose of at least one customer. He sold fentanyl and fentanyl analogues on both Alphabay and Dream. The judge issued a sentence he thought fit the crime; a life for a life.

Achey’s case, partially due to Achey being one of the first few darknet fentanyl vendors busted after the death of a customer, involved several local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies. Following the life sentence handed down by Judge Byron, DEA Special Agent Adolphus P. Wright said that “those who feel safe hiding behind the dark web” to distribute drugs will “pay a high price for your actions,” in reference to Achey’s life sentenc.
Fake Percocet Dealer Sentenced to 14 Years in Prison

Tyler Liming, a 26 year old from Clermont County, Ohio, received a lengthy prison sentence for selling fake Percocet pills. Clermont County Assistant Prosecutor Katherine Terpstra announced that the Ohio drug dealer received a prison sentence of 14 years. Like Achey, Liming faced extra legal scrutiny after one of his customers overdosed.

One of his customers overdosed on a pill a Percocet. The customer thought the pill contained oxycodone, given the branding and stamps on the pill. Law enforcement discovered that the individual had ingested U-47700 (U4). Although U4 packs a much weaker punch than fentanyl, the drug still has no place in Percocet pills—Percocet pills contain oxycodone. And buyers expect oxycodone when dosing pills sold to them as oxycodone. This leads, frequently, to overdoses, to criminal investigations, and to lengthy prison sentences as seen in this case.

Global Operation Takes Down DDoS-for-Hire Site

Law enforcement agencies across the world celebrated the takedown of what Europol called the “largest” ddos-as-a-service website. Several arrests were connected to the takedown and the arrests alone involved cooperation with the police in numerous countries. Europol and the United States Department of Justice called the joint account “Operation Pacifier.” They even uploaded one of the fancy seizure banners similar to the banners placed on the Alphabay and Hansa market servers.

Webstresser.org masqueraded as a legitimate stress tester for researchers and pentesters, the announcement explained. In reality, though, the site sold almost exclusively unauthorized DDoS attacks to anyone with some extra cash and a desire to see a site drop offline for a short period of time. The site’s owners practically gave away their home addresses on the Webstresser.org’s home page.

They did not actually publish their addresses on the site, but the digital trail connected to the staff’s usernames enabled authorities to easily identify the teenagers responsible for enabling just about anyone to launch 350Gbps DDoS attacks against their internet enemies. The administrators and staff have been apprehended, but an investigation into the site’s customers is ongoing.

Berlin Customs Allegedly Identified Nearly 1,500 Darknet Drug Buyers

Something big might be happening in Germany, information collected by a Berlin news outlet revealed. The Berlin-Brandenburg Customs Office claimed to have identified 1,500 darknet drug buyers in and around Berlin. The scale of this secretive investigation really set it apart from nearly every darknet investigation known to the public.