181,000 registered users, 25 million euros in sales, six arrests, 500 officers on duty in North Rhine-Westphalia alone: the police have carried out more than 100 searches in a nationwide strike against the largest German-speaking criminal trading platform on the Internet, as investigators said on Friday in Düsseldorf reported.
The alleged operator of “Crimemarket”, a 23-year-old, was arrested in Korschenbroich in the Lower Rhine region. He is being investigated for money laundering and computer fraud. The investigators in Iceland secured the server.
Users must expect consequences
The platform was accessible to everyone on the Internet, not on the Darknet. Accordingly, many minors also used them, said Düsseldorf police chief Miriam Brauns. It is frightening how easy it is to buy and commission criminal behavior on freely available sites on the Internet. Starting today, users should expect the police to contact them, said Brauns.
“The “Crimemarket” was closed today,” said North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU) to the dpa. The North Rhine-Westphalia police have thus achieved a huge blow against cybercriminals of the very first order. “So we weren’t dealing with the small online retailer next door, but with the German-speaking Amazon for cybercrime.”
Criminal services as well as detailed instructions on serious crimes or drugs are available on the platform. The blow – the last data backup was made on Friday morning – led to considerable movement in the scene. The entire database of the platform could be backed up.
“Callers reported to the police in Düsseldorf and Cologne last night with distorted voices and pretended to be journalists in order to get information,” reported public prosecutor Christoph Hebbecker.
“A kind of Amazon for criminals”
The police secured numerous pieces of evidence, especially cell phones, IT devices and data carriers. The police in North Rhine-Westphalia seized drugs in 21 cases, and more than 600,000 euros in cash and other assets were seized.
Administrators, moderators and users of the platform would now have to expect action from prosecutors. “The site quickly turned out to be a kind of Amazon for criminals,” said criminal director Michael Graf von Moltke. Any twelve-year-old could access these pages using any available browser without much IT knowledge.
“We were shocked by what we found.” Instructions for computer fraud, hacking, drug delivery or protection money extortion were available to order; war weapons could even be ordered there, as was a tool for forging identity cards. Administrators, moderators and users of the platform would now have to expect action from prosecutors.
Investigators secured a mirrored server in the Netherlands. This is important so that the platform cannot go back online a few hours later. The platform started in 2018 with 14 users. Then it grew exponentially. The investigators have been on the trail of the operators since 2020.
North Rhine-Westphalia was a focus of the campaign. 36 searches were carried out in 33 cities in North Rhine-Westphalia, the remaining 66 are spread across the rest of the country. Of the six suspects arrested, three were arrested in North Rhine-Westphalia.
The access was preceded by intensive investigations led by the North Rhine-Westphalia Cybercrime Central Office in Cologne. An investigative commission called “Agora” (Greek for marketplace) has been collecting evidence for years.
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