The Legacy of the Silk Road
Silk Road was an online black market and the first modern darknet market. It was launched in 2011 by its American founder Ross Ulbricht under the pseudonym "Dread Pirate Roberts". As part of the dark web, Silk Road operated as a hidden service on the Tor network, allowing users to buy and sell products and services between each other anonymously. All transactions were conducted with bitcoin, a cryptocurrency which aided in protecting user identities. The website was known for its illegal drug marketplace, among other illegal and legal product listings. Between February 2011 and July 2013, the site facilitated sales amounting to 9,519,664 Bitcoins.
The Fall of Silk Road
In October 2013, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) shut down the Silk Road website and arrested Ulbricht. Silk Road 2.0 came online the next month, run by other administrators of the former site, but was shut down the following year as part of Operation Onymous. In 2015, Ulbricht was convicted in federal court for multiple charges related to operating Silk Road and was given two life sentences without possibility of parole. He was pardoned by President Donald Trump in 2025.
The FBI shut down the site permanently, seized more than 144,000 bitcoins (then valued at $34 million), and arrested several users of the site, including the founder, Ross Ulbricht, who made about $80 million in commissions from transactions carried out within the site. Ulbricht was convicted in 2015 and was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole until President Trump pardoned him.
Does the Silk Road Website Still Active?
The Silk Road, as it was before being taken down in 2013, no longer exists. However, the dark web is still operating, and most things found on Silk Road are available via various venues. Authorities continue to crack down on illegal operations.
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