Blockchain analytics agency Chainalysis has printed a brand new report detailing the dynamics of darknet markets and fraud outlets after the previous large Hydra Market collapsed attributable to joint actions from authorities in Germany and the USA.
After the U.S. Division of Treasury Workplace of Overseas Property Management (OFAC) sanctioned Hydra in April and German companies ordered its closure, common every day income for all darkish internet markets fell from $4.2 million to $447,000.
Complete darknet market income for 2022 was $1.5 billion, a big decline from $3.1 billion in 2021. Different marketplaces most definitely channeled their efforts in direction of attracting former Hydra distributors and customers, as most fraud outlets gained their preliminary market share after the platform’s collapse.
The Battle for Darknet Market Dominance
As per the report, three main darknet markets gained dominance within the wake of Hydra’s downfall. Whereas their revenues didn’t come near Hydra’s, Mega Darknet Market, Blacksprut Market, and OMG!OMG! Market recorded greater shares.
Notably, every of the three platforms dominated the market at completely different durations. The primary was OMG, whose interval of dominance was instantly after Hydra’s demise.
Though OMG grew to become lively in July 2020, its deposit volumes had been so low that it was extra of a private operation than a darknet market. Nevertheless, the platform recorded excessive inflows as quickly as Hydra went down, most of which got here from Hydra counterparties.
The inflows continued till June, when OMG suffered a distributed denial of service (DDoS) assault. The assault precipitated distributors and customers emigrate to Blacksprut Market and Mega Darknet Market. Blacksprut additionally acquired hacked in November, forcing customers to maneuver to Mega Market.
Nonetheless, OMG recorded extra inflows and actions than Blacksprut and Mega Markets all through 2022.
An Administrative Hyperlink?
Curiously, on-chain information has proven that OMG’s central wallets use a gaggle of deposit addresses beforehand utilized by Hydra, which is owned by a high-risk change working primarily in Russia.
Blacksprut and Mega despatched funds to the identical group of addresses however not as a lot as OMG. This means an administrative or vendor overlap between all 4 markets however primarily between Hydra and OMG.
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