By Federico Bertola

Drug trafficking on darknet based marketplaces has become a highly concerning topic in law enforcement activities, recently. Even though Dark Markets represent only a tiny fraction of the global drug trade, they are changing the drug markets' social networks, introducing a new paradigm of the link between vendors and buyers of drugs. The aim of this study is to critically review the dark markets' ecosystem and the previous literature regarding these new marketplaces, trying to investigate how the drug trade is changing with these new technologies, and the role of organised crime (OC) in these new illegal markets. And trying to understand how and whether it involved OC on these cyber drug markets and the chain behind them. Despite opinions of part of the academy, the results show that there are no empirical evidences of direct involvement of OC as vendors in dark markets. However, there is evidence of an indirect role of OC in darknet drug trafficking, as supplier of illegal drugs to the online-vendors. 

AM J QUALITATIVE RES, Volume 4, Issue 2 (Special Issue), pp. 27-34

By Rasmus Munksgaard and James Martin

Cryptomarkets represent a growing component of the global illicit drugs trade. Australia is over-represented in the proportion of online vendors who use these platforms to reach drug consumers. Despite the growth in online drug trading, relatively little is known about people who use cryptomarkets to sell drugs. This study addresses the knowledge gap and provides qualitative insights into this new, and little understood, cohort of offenders. The study found that vendors perceive less risk of violence and police intervention when selling drugs online and that the potential for profit exceeds that available when selling drugs offline.

Trends & issues in crime and criminal justice no. 608. Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology. 2020. 12p.