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Phishing Darknet Users for Bitcoins
- buildbuildbuild 3y agoPSA: Stealing is illegal.
- HWR_14 3y agoPSA: Many criminals enforce 'don't steal from us' in with punishments that are more brutal and with a lower procedural protections than the state does.
- buildbuildbuild 3y agoIs someone depositing and withdrawing from a darknet market without transacting a criminal? Internationally? Are all buyers of substances the U.S. controls inherently “professional criminals”? Does the belief that someone is a criminal justify taking their money? (I trace cryptocurrency professionally, depositing is key to identifying clusters and it sure is nice to get the money back)
- mteam88 3y agoYes. Whitehatting is ethically fine if you actually know they are scammers.
- newaccount74 3y agoOnly if they catch you.
- dotancohen 3y agoI would love to see your stance substantiated by an accepted (preferable Western) law or moral code.
- bryanrasmussen 3y agoThis is of course an obvious side effect of having to protect one's criminal resources from as large a potential criminal threat as the state does without the state's resources.
- HWR_14 3y agoIs it an obvious side effect of limited resources? I thought it was an obvious side effect of the lack of any need or desire to maintain fairness.
- bryanrasmussen 3y agoAs a general rule the problems of misbehavior among criminals are not actions that in the courts would be seen as criminal matters but rather things that would be seen as civil. Despite what one sees in the movies the general problem one has is not some guys running up with masks on ripping you off of the money you made selling drugs, but rather the people you have fronted drugs to not giving you the money they owe you or the people you are buying drugs from ripping you off (using drugs because it is the most generally distributed type of organized crime but similar situations apply to other forms of organized crime) The problem then is that you have people who have taken from you, there is no system to force them to pay, you must assume the state's monopoly of violence to get what is owed or decide to write it off. If you write off too great of losses you cannot stay in business, if you write off losses too frequently you cannot stay in business, and in writing off losses you may give other people the idea that they can steal from you as well. Thus as you get to a certain level of organized crime you have to punish the people who do not fulfill the contracts they have undertaken with you. This is sometimes also described as the actual origins of the mob, because they were the guys who could enforce contracts among the various criminal factions (by using violence)
- willcipriano 3y agoPSA: Applying a consistent moral code when others refuse to do the same leaves you at a competitive disadvantage. It's better to play by the rules of whomever you are playing with. A thief likes to play the theft game. Murders like to play the murder game. Normal people play the polite society game. Play the game that is currently being played, not the game you think everyone should be playing.
- EscapeFromNY 3y agoIf someone is buying weed on a darknet site, would you feel morally justified in stealing from them?
- willcipriano 3y agoIt they aren't stealing from someone then that's not the same game. A guy selling credit card numbers, given the opportunity he'd have nothing left.
- lelanthran 3y ago> If someone is buying weed on a darknet site, would you feel morally justified in stealing from them? No, but I'd guess that GP feels morally justified in buying weed from him or selling weed to him. If the weed-buyer isn't playing the theft game, why do you believe that the GP would play the theft game?
- EscapeFromNY 3y agoThis is an article about darknet markets, and when I hear "darknet markets" I think of drugs. The impression I get from Bruce Schneier's blog is that other shady stuff like stealing credit cards or murder-for-hire sites (which are all fake) mostly happens on the clearnet. So it was odd to see someone make the casual jump from darknet markets to theft/murder.
- willcipriano 3y agoI was thinking of sites that deal exclusively in carding, scams, fencing stolen goods, etc. If your actions have blowback on morally innocent people (ie. Technically a law was broken but it was a crime without a direct victim), inadvertently or not, you are not acting morally.
- loeg 3y agos/PSA/Tl;dr/ (the fine article covers this, at the end)
- George83728 3y agoYou're correct and the other responses you've got miss the mark. While stealing for thieves might be morally or ethically defensible (in some moral or ethical frameworks), it IS still illegal. You can go to prison for it. Your PSA is warranted. For your comment to be not just downvoted but also flagged for saying something true is a farce.
- draw_down 3y agoAs usual, if I’m reading about it like this it’s too late to try. This is fun to think about though, it’s like being Omar from “The Wire”. As the author points out, different targets have differing moral valence.
- loeg 3y agoPeople have run phishing schemes against Darknet targets almost as soon as the concept existed. It's both "too late" (in the sense that it's no longer novel and everyone expects it) and, apparently, not too late (in the sense that attackers keep thinking it will be worth their time).
- Tepix 3y agoThe captcha anti-phishing scheme the darknet site bohemia came up with is really smart!
- cwillu 3y agoFull title: Ripping Off Professional Criminals by Fermenting Onions - Phishing Darknet Users for Bitcoins Had the second half been used as the truncated title, I would have saved myself the click: I was hoping for something related to onion futures or some such.
- msla 3y agoI thought it was about making really disgusting moonshine.
- AlbertCory 3y agoMe, too. I thought "Strawberry wine: fine. Blueberry wine: fine. Onion wine: no thanks."
- thatguy0900 3y agoI would try it. I would imagine it could be interesting for cooking if nothing else
- tbrownaw 3y agoPerhaps if you caramelize (for real, not just saute) the onions first?
- psychphysic 3y agoAbsolutely also the writing is very tedious.
- cwillu 3y agoI wouldn't be shocked if the text was created in a similar manner to the images.
- idontwantthis 3y agoWhat's this got to do with the price of onions? Unfortunately, nothing.
- paulpauper 3y agoit's simple to test: send a little. if it's legit it will work. who is gonna send entire stash in one tx to a site?
- Scoundreller 3y agoOr it works for small amounts and then selectively fails for large amounts sent from wallets that already sent small amounts.
- Robotbeat 3y agoThe main reason why not to rip off professional criminals is you’re likely to be shot.
- nimbius 3y agofrom an infosec perspective, im surprised no ones brought up how stupid dangerous this is. crypto mixers and ransomware groups frequently have ties to organized crime, so the list of people you are "ripping off" could include formidably dangerous groups like the black axe mafia. If you really are ripping off "professional" criminals, you clearly havent considered their moral turpitude or your own personal safety.
- TheIronMark 3y agoDoing it on Tor is probably fine. Writing a blog about it with your name, however, is unwise.
- victorbjorklund 3y agoWouldn't be surprised if someone else rips off some criminals and they get angry at this guy just because the way it is done is similar.
- _-____-_ 3y agoHe's not breaking any news here. This has been a well known and widely deployed attack for years, to the point that darknet markets impose multiple anti-phishing mitigations (as best they can, at least, e.g. signing a PGP message with the URL and then posting that PGP key on the landing page, and trying various JS tricks for reverse proxy detection to warn user they might be on the wrong site).
- Scoundreller 3y agoI thought crypto mixers were run by the Feds?
- thatguy0900 3y agoYou probably don't want to be bragging about stealing money from the feds too much either
- AlbertCory 3y agoAs others have pointed out: Good thing: criminals don't go to the law when you rip them off. Another good thing: You don't suffer any moral qualms about stealing their money. Not so good: they kill you instead
- alexanderh 3y agoThe big problem I have with this, is that: are drug dealers and organized money launderers professional criminals? who are taking advantage of people, and spreading suffering? Yes, they are. But lots of regular ol' struggling drug addicts use these services, to get generally much safer drugs than on the streets, under much safer circumstances. Sure, everyone who uses these types of markets and services is (usually) committing a crime, but I think its a bit much to call everyone you'd wind up taking advantage of here a "professional criminal". And that thinking just sorta feeds the stigma and condemnation of drug addicts who are struggling and just want to be safe, and are already taken advantage of by society enough. I don't think you can say this is 100% morally sound. Unless you're super mindful and careful about it, you'll have collateral damage of people who aren't bad people, even if they are doing illegal things.
- themoonisachees 3y agoThis exact thought is talked about in the article.
- and5548 3y ago[dead]