Webinar Explores OSINT Methods for Investigating Darknet Marketplaces
Summary
A webinar transcript outlines how investigators can correlate marketplace aliases, posts, PGP keys, cryptocurrency wallets, and other online accounts to investigate vendors and illicit trade, while noting that such links are not always certain.
Key points
- The speakers describe how darknet marketplaces operate, including cryptocurrency payments and escrow.
- The demonstrated workflow connects aliases across forums and marketplaces with posts, product listings, PGP keys, shipping details, and contact information.
- Investigators can combine cryptocurrency addresses and transaction histories with darknet mentions to explore links and build timelines.
- Examples show how identifiers may connect to email and social media accounts, but the speakers caution that apparent matches can be coincidental and are not proof of identity.
- The webinar discusses passive intelligence gathering and, in some contexts, direct engagement as approaches to investigating illicit activity.
- Potential applications discussed include law-enforcement investigations and corporate monitoring of darknet sources, leaked databases, and ransomware activity.
Article Details
- Topic
- Using OSINT and darknet data to investigate illegal trade, identify marketplace users, and trace cryptocurrency activity
People
Alexandre CazesDiscussed as the founder of Alphabay and an example of identifying a darknet marketplace administrator.David AlleyDarkOwl representative and webinar presenter discussing darknet data collection and investigations.Gal ValleriusDiscussed as the individual behind the Oxymonster alias in a darknet marketplace deanonymization example.Ivan KravstovSocial Links representative and webinar presenter demonstrating OSINT methods for darknet investigations.John Kohler RacinoIdentified in the article as the Berlusconi Market administrator discussed in a law-enforcement investigation example.Ross UlbrichtDiscussed as the founder of Silk Road and an example of identifying a darknet marketplace administrator.
Vendors
Products
DarkOwlDavid Alley of DarkOwl FZE and Ivan Kravstov of Social Links dive into the topic of harnessing OSINT to expose illegal trade on the darknet.DiscordWe see that a lot of hackers are also gamers, and they use Discord for communications.Social Links ProThe principles of working with the posts are similar to the way a user of Social Links Pro or a SOC tool in general can work with social graphs.TelegramWe also are having a lot of success picking up cryptocurrency transactions off of Telegram channels.