Law enforcement in Slovakia has arrested two individuals for their involvement in drugs and weapons trafficking, among which, one is suspected of operating the Dark Web marketplace known as Bloomsfield.
The arrests took place on March 1 and were carried out by the Slovak National Crime Agency (NAKA) at two locations in Bratislava, Slovakia’s capital.
Local press reports the names of the two suspects as Adam, 33, and Lukasha, 28. It is currently unknown who operated the Dark Web portal.
Authorities take down Bloomsfield marketplace
Europol agents provided assistance and the agency revealed the arrests in a press release yesterday. The EU law enforcement agency didn’t mention the Dark Web marketplace’s name, but today, specialized websites that scan the Dark Web reported the Bloomsfield portal under a new name as “THIS HIDDEN SITE HAS BEEN SEIZED.”
After Bleeping Computer accessed the portal, the following page loaded, confirming that authorities did take down the Bloomsfield market.
Authorities discovered the marketplace by accident
According to the Europol statement regarding this operation, investigators didn’t initially know the suspect they were following was the operator of the Bloomsfield market.
Initially, they acted based on a suspicion that the suspect was involved in drugs and weapons trafficking.
After they searched his home, investigators found a server housing the Bloomsfield marketplace. During their search, authorities also found five firearms, approximately 600 rounds of ammunition of different calibres, sophisticated indoor cannabis plantation, 58 cannabis plants and a Bitcoin wallet containing Bitcoin worth €203,000 at the time of the arrest ($252,000 at today’s EUR-USD exchange rate).
Bloomsfield data shared with other agencies
The Bloomsfield Dark Web marketplace was set up by a former Silk Road drugs vendor and evolved from a one-man shop to a fully fledged multi-user marketplace.
The marketplace was never as popular as other markets, such as Dream, Agora, or AlphaBay. Nonetheless, the market had a dedicated community on Reddit and might have had some security issues.
Europol said it started sharing the data they found on the Bloomsfield server with law enforcement in other countries. Below is a video from the arrests.
Source:https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/dark-web-marketplace-shut-down-in-slovakia/
Working as a cyber security solutions architect, Alisa focuses on application and network security. Before joining us she held a cyber security researcher positions within a variety of cyber security start-ups. She also experience in different industry domains like finance, healthcare and consumer products.
