Hydra Market

Why in news?

• German police have shut down servers of the world’s largest illegal darknet marketplace Hydra, and seized bitcoins worth 23 million euros.

About Hydra Market:

• Hydra Market founded in 2015, which was considered to be the world’s largest and oldest darknet marketplace of illegal items and services.
• Hydra served Russian-speaking markets, selling narcotics but also stolen credit card data, counterfeit currency and fake identity documents, masking the identities of those involved using the Tor encryption network.
• The marketplace had around 17 million customer accounts and over 19,000 vendor accounts, according to the BKA.

What is ‘dark’ net?

• The darknet refers to encrypted networks on the Internet that are not indexed by search engines such as Google, Yahoo or Bing.
• It is a layer of the Internet accessible only by using special software like Tor (The Onion Router), or I2P (Invisible Internet Project).
• These are networks that are only available to a select group of people and not to the general Internet public, and only accessible via authorization, specific software and configurations.
• Such networks have faced increased pressure from international law enforcement after a boom in usage during the coronavirus pandemic.

PRACTICE QUESTION:

The term ‘Hydra Market’, recently seen in news is associated with:

(a) Cyber security

(b) Invasive species

(c) Marine exploration

(d) Energy generation

Answer