German police have shut down what they claim to be the country’s largest illegal dark web marketplace and arrested a suspected administrator of the site.
Investigators from the Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor’s Office – Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) and the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) made the arrest on Monday, along with seizures of “high-value vehicles,” evidence and €1m ($1.1m) in crypto assets.
Servers used to support the Crimenetwork marketplace were also taken down, according to the BKA.
Crimenetwork enabled buyers and sellers to trade stolen data, drugs, forged documents and other illegal goods and services, the BKA said. It had been operating since 2012 and built up a following of over 100,000 users and more than 100 sellers, mainly from German-speaking countries.
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As is the case with most dark web marketplaces, buyers used cryptocurrency to pay for these goods and services. The BKA claimed that the site enabled sales of at least 1000 BTC ($96.9m) and over 20,000 XMR ($4m) between 2018-24, with the site’s operators receiving commission of 1-5% on each sale plus monthly fees paid by sellers.
The 29-year-old arrested on Monday is accused of acting as technical administrator of Crimenetwork and has been charged with operating a criminal trading platform and dealing in narcotics.
The BKA and ZIT coordinated with Dutch authorities during their investigation, specifically the Zeeland-West-Brabant Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Zeeland-West-Brabant Police.
They are currently investigating user and transaction data obtained from the platform.
German Police on a Roll
The cyber-policing breakthrough is the latest win for German police, following their disruption in March of Crimemarket, which was previously described as the country’s largest illegal dark web marketplace.
Several months before that, in December 2023, the BKA and ZIT announced the takedown of Kingdom Market.
More recently, in September 2024, the BKA and ZIT announced the dismantling of dozens of cryptocurrency exchanges that they accused of enabling money laundering and other offenses.