Nearly 300 Arrested In US-Europe Dark Web Drug Bust
A multi-continental crackdown has halted a major “dark web” drugs marketplace, with international police arresting 288 suspects and recovering more than 50 million euros ($54.8 million) in cash and virtual currency, Europol said Tuesday.
The operation called SpecTor by US, British, Brazilian and European law enforcement also netted almost a tonne of drugs and 117 firearms, Europe’s policing agency said.
“In an operation coordinated by Europol and involving nine countries, law enforcement have seized the illegal dark web marketplace ‘Monopoly Market’ and arrested 288 suspects involved in buying or selling drugs on the dark web,” the Hague-based Europol said in a statement.
“A number of these suspects were considered high-value targets,” it said.
The sting followed a successful 2021 operation by German police which saw it seize the Monopoly Market’s criminal infrastructure.
“Europol has been compiling intelligence packages based on troves of evidence provided by the German authorities,” Europol said.
“These target packages, created by cross-matching and analysing the collected data and evidence served as the basis for hundreds of national investigations,” it said.
“As a result, 288 vendors and buyers who engaged in tens of thousands of sales of illicit goods were arrested across Europe, Britain, the United States and Brazil,” Europol said.
The largest number of arrests were in the United States with 153, Britain 55, Germany 52 and the Netherlands, 10. One suspect was also arrested in Brazil.
The US Justice Department said several suspects have already been convicted or were being prosecuted following Operation SpecTor — which it described as the “largest international operation against darknet trafficking of fentanyl and opioids”.
This included a Florida man who was sentenced to 16 years in December on drug possession and distribution charges, the DOJ said in a statement.
Police also recovered 50.8 million euros ($53.4 million) in cash and virtual currency and seized 850 kilos of drugs, mainly amphetamines and opioids, Europol and the DOJ added.
