How Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies finance the dark web’s underbelly

RAPIDLY inflating and crashing cryptocurrencies are the hot topic this summer, but they are also driving the internet’s seedy anything goes underbelly, a.k.a. the dark web.

BITCOIN — and other cryptocurrencies — are all the rage right now, with speculators making what would appear to be eye-watering profits one day that are wiped out the next as the market booms and crashes in ever-faster cycles.

But it is also the currency of choice for the so-called Dark Web, that safe haven for everyone from whistleblowers to white supremacists, paedophiles and terrorists.

To access it, aside from having an escape-out-of-jail plan, you’ll need two things: an ­encrypted router, and bitcoin.

Bitcoin is used to fund dodgy transactions in the dark web.

According to new research out of UTS Business School, bitcoin is now the PayPal of the dark web: nearly half of all bitcoin trans­actions are related to buying or selling illegal goods.

In the interest of research, I ­recently got myself a piece of the ­bitcoin pie.

With the value of bitcoin up a staggering 1300 per cent since the beginning of the year, buying some of the currency seemed easy. What did I have to lose?

A lot, as it turns out, but we’ll get to that in a moment.

Accessing the dark web was going to be the tricky part.

Armed with my newly acquired small percentage of bitcoin (at the time of my purchase one bitcoin was sitting at $24,000), along with a private investigator who works in digital forensics for criminal court cases (and knows a heck of a lot about the intricacies of the dark web), we set up an encrypted laptop with the appropriate software.

We connect to a router known as Tor (short for The Onion Router) ­because, like an onion, the layers around it are supposed to protect you from being hacked, traced, followed or robbed.

In order to further preserve our ­location, we connect through a server in Switzerland, bounce through Pan­ama, and swing back through the British Virgin Islands.

The first site that pops up offers hitmen for hire, purporting to be ­operated by the Chechen mob.

“Why use a paid killer?” the site asks. “Because it is affordable, safe and allows you to get away with ­murder.” Right. And just who are these ­alleged hitmen?

“We use low-level gang members who use a handgun and a hooded jacket, waiting for the victim in a parking lot.”

And apparently you only pay (by bitcoin of course) once the murder has been carried out, with the site ­urging you to check local news outlets or social media for proof.

Hiring a hitman will set you back around $5000 for someone basic to $200,000 for a full-fledged, fully trained sniper. Smart assassins, “who can make it look like an accident”, are offered at extra cost.

Samantha Brett is a reporter for Seven News.

Do they have hitmen in Australia? “Yes,” the site promises. And in India and Japan as well.

Our internet connection suddenly turns dark and we have to reset. “Could be the government,” the ­investigator tells me as we reboot.

Back in the trenches of the dark web, I am faced with a multitude of how-to guides promising to teach everything from “a 10-step guide to jumping bail and fleeing the country,” to “how to beat a polygraph test if you are a sex offender”. How about if you’re itching to get away with ­Insider Trading? There’s a guide on that too.

I’m offered an original UK passport, to have a hacker destroy a business, and to put an enemy on the sex offender’s registry.

I stumble across the disturbing Suicide Apartment, a private and anonymous environment “for people who search for a partner to leave the world with”.

Weapons are available in abundance. As are drugs, from freshly cut cocaine to organic cannabis, German weed, Kamagra (which is advertised as the cheap version of Viagra), Xanax, MDA, speed … And that’s barely even scratching the surface.

As I retreat back home and log back on to the surface of the web that we know and love, my foray into the dark web makes me feel a little ­queasy; like I am somehow, suddenly being watched.

Bitcoin continues to rise and fall on the market.

I call Detective Superintendent Arthur Katsogiannis, commander of the newly formed NSW Cybercrime Squad, to tell him what I saw.

“I can confirm we do monitor the dark web,” he says. “We know that this is a new frontier, and that this poses one of the great challenges for modern-day policing and law ­enforcement.” He says bitcoin poses further problems, enabling anonymity when selling illegal commodities and laundering money.

“It’s deregulated and decentralised. But I can assure you we have a presence on the dark web. And we will be pursuing these criminals and bringing them to justice.”

I decide then and there to put my bitcoin (which by the way has now dramatically plummeted in value) to good use and donate it to one of the many registered charities that have jumped on board the bitcoin train.

Because while criminals are ­readily snapping up bitcoin in order to carry out their dirty work, losing most of your money within a week has no appeal to me.

Personally,  I’ll  stick  with  good ­ol’-fashioned cash. At least I know where it stands.

Samantha Brett is a reporter for Seven News and author of The Game Changers: Success Secrets From Inspirational Women Changing the Game and Influencing the World