Monero

Wikileaks Gathers $37M in BTC Since 2010 – Over $400K Sent After Julian Assange’s Arrest

26/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

The world was shocked when Wikileaks cofounder Julian Assange was arrested in April after being cooped up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012. Following his arrest, the original Wikileaks bitcoin address saw significant support as $32,000 worth of BTC poured into the wallet in two days. Since 2010, Wikileaks’ address saw 4,043 BTC donated or around $37 million at today’s exchange rates. Moreover, Wikileaks has gathered over $400,000 in BTC donations since Julian Assange was taken into custody last spring.

Also Read: Tradeblock Estimates Post-Halving Mining Cost of $12,500 per BTC

Wikileaks Gathers Over $400K in Bitcoin Donations Since Julian Assange Was Taken Into Custody

Years ago, the U.S. government started an investigation on Wikileaks cofounder Julian Assange for computer-related crimes allegedly committed in 2012. However, Assange requested asylum at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and Ecuador’s government allowed him to stay until 2019. A U.S. indictment charges Assange with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion during the Chelsea Manning investigation. Manning accessed classified government intelligence and it was subsequently published on Wikileaks. On April 11, 2019, the Ecuadorian Embassy in London was raided and he was charged with failing to show up to court. Assange also faces extradition to the U.S., but he remains in prison awaiting trial, which started on Monday. Assange is also accused of using the Ecuadorian Embassy to meet with Russian leaders and international hackers.

Immediately after Assange was arrested, BTC donations started pouring in and the Wikileaks donation wallet saw roughly $20K in BTC on April 11th alone. The following day, donations continued and that Friday Wikileaks accrued $32,000 worth of BTC donations. Wikileaks has recently started a new address and has asked people not to donate to the older address. The old address obtained approximately 4,043 BTC ($37 million) before the nonprofit organization shared a new address. The new Wikileaks BTC address has 6.76 BTC ($63K) on February 25 and people can also donate bitcoin cash (BCH), litecoin (LTC), ethereum (ETH), monero (XMR), and zcash (ZEC). Since the arrest last April, Wikileaks obtained over $400,000 worth of BTC including the 6.76 BTC donated during the course of last week.

The First Financial Blockade Against Wikileaks

Wikileaks has always been supported by the general public and cryptocurrency advocates have rallied for the website and Assange as well. Donations pay for “Wikileaks projects, staff, servers, and protective infrastructure.” In 2010, Wikileaks and Assange contemplated using bitcoin for donations after the U.S. government, Senator McCain, Senator Lieberman, Visa, Mastercard, Paypal, Amex, and Moneybookers created a financial blockade against the organization. In 2017, Assange tweeted that the 2010 financial blockade invoked “[Wikileaks] to invest in Bitcoin” and the nonprofit generated a “50,000% return” from those donations.

But when it was first announced in 2010, Satoshi Nakamoto and a few other bitcoiners were not too keen on Wikileaks using bitcoin for donations at that time. When someone said that the Bitcoin community should “bring it on” with Wikileaks, Nakamoto wholeheartedly disagreed. “No, don’t ‘bring it on.’ The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be strengthened along the way. I make this appeal to WikiLeaks not to try to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a small beta community in its infancy. You would not stand to get more than pocket change, and the heat you would bring would likely destroy us at this stage.” Nakamoto stated five days later on December 11, 2010:

It would have been nice to get this attention in any other context. WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet’s nest, and the swarm is headed towards us.

Proof-of-Life, the Banking Blockade 2.0, and ‘Bitcoin Is the Real Occupy Wall Street’

Satoshi’s words didn’t stop Assange and Wikileaks from using bitcoin and a number of people believe that Wikileaks and the creation of the Silk Road marketplace helped propel bitcoin to new heights. The crypto donations strengthened Wikileaks as well, and in December 2017, the nonprofit suffered a second financial blockade. Assange told his Twitter followers a few times that month about the situation. He called it a “banking blockade 2.0” and Assange said U.S. intelligence was making it difficult for Wikileaks donors.

Assange suggested people should send cryptocurrencies instead and Wikileaks started accepting digital assets like zcash, monero, and litecoin. The Wikileaks founder has always supported bitcoin and a year before the banking blockade 2.0, people were concerned that Assange wasn’t alive because they hadn’t heard from him in a while. At the time, the Wikileaks editor-in-chief read the BTC blockchain hash of block 447506 during a recorded video. A number of people believe that the hash was read during the video to prove Assange was alive.

A week before the banking blockade 2.0, Assange tweeted that “Bitcoin is the real Occupy Wall Street.” Crypto enthusiasts have been awfully kind to Assange over the years, donating more than $37 million worth of BTC since 2010, and over $400K in BTC donations since he was taken into custody last April. The website Assange created has given the world an inside look at how governments worldwide have committed crimes against humanity. Wikileaks has a treasure trove of logged data that explores controversial subjects like Guantanamo Bay, the Afghan War, the Iraq War, and shady government dealings. There’s a reason why governments want people like Assange and Edward Snowden silenced. However, Assange knew early on that governments cannot stop censorship-resistant money.

What do you think about the $37 million worth of BTC donations given to Wikileaks since 2010 and over $400K in BTC donations since he was taken into custody last April? Let us know what you think about this topic in the comments section below.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. It is not an offer or solicitation of an offer to buy or sell, or a recommendation, endorsement, or sponsorship of any products, services, or companies. Bitcoin.com does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice. Neither the company nor the author is responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in connection with the use of or reliance on any content, goods or services mentioned in this article.

Image credits: Shutterstock, Wikileaks, Wiki Commons, Pixabay, Fair Use, and Twitter.

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New Report Finds North Korean Mining of XMR Increased Tenfold in 2019, Online Activity 300%

13/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

A report published by cybersecurity organization Insikt Group claims internet use in North Korea has grown significantly in the past three years. The group cites a “300% increase in the volume of activity to and from North Korean networks since 2017,” and part of this activity involves monero (XMR) mining. Insikt observes a tenfold increase in mining of the privacy coin by the DPRK since May 2019. Though the global internet is used only by elite parties in the communist nation, crypto is said to be mined in an effort to avoid Western sanctions, with monero likely “more attractive than Bitcoin” according the group, thanks to its anonymity.

Also Read: Hacker Group Lazarus Uses Fake Exchanges, Telegram Groups

New Report by Insikt Group on North Korean Mining Activity

Insikt Group, a division of private cybersecurity firm Recorded Future, has just released a new report on internet activity in North Korea which finds that both internet usage and mining of monero have increased drastically in recent months.

“For this research, Insikt Group examined North Korean senior leadership’s internet activity by analyzing third-party data, IP geolocation, Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) routing tables, network traffic analysis, and open source intelligence (OSINT) using a number of tools,” the paper states. “The data analyzed for this report spans from January 1, 2019 to November 1, 2019.”

As global internet usage is restricted to elite parties and political officials in the communist regime, findings on crypto mining and network usage can be viewed as all the more compelling. Insikt observes:

For the North Korean political and military elite, the 2019 data show that the internet is not simply a fascination or leisure activity, but is a critical tool for revenue generation, gaining access to prohibited technologies and knowledge, and operational coordination.

The report analyzes the global internet, accessible only to these parties, and does not focus on activity occurring via “Kwangmyong,” the country’s domestic intranet.

10x Increase in Monero Mining

For those in the crypto space, the finding likely to be most notable relates to mining of XMR in the regime. Stating that as of November last year the group has continued “to observe small-scale mining of Bitcoin,” Insikt details, “The traffic volume and rate of communication with peers has remained relatively static over the course of the last two years,” and that “we remain unable to determine hash rate or builds.”

While North Korea has previously been reported to be involved in the mining, stealing, or generating of bitcoin, litecoin, and monero, Insikt emphasizes:

By our assessment, as of November 2019, we have observed at least a tenfold increase in Monero mining activity. We are unable to determine the hash rate because all of the activity is proxied through one IP address, which we believe hosts at least several unknown machines behind it.

The report cites the “Wannacry” ransomware attack of 2017, noting: “Monero has been used by North Korean operators since at least August 2017, when the Bitcoin profits from the Wannacry attack were laundered through a Bitcoin mixer and ultimately converted to Monero.”

The group further elaborates: “Monero is also different in that it was designed to be mined by non-specialized machines, and its mining ports tend to scale by capacity. For example, many miners use port 3333 for low-end machines, and port 7777 for higher-end, higher-capacity machines.” The notable increase is observed as occurring over port 7777 according to the group, which added:

…we believe that these two factors — anonymity and the ability to be mined by non-specialized machines — likely make Monero more attractive than Bitcoin to North Korean users.

Malware, Foreign Operators, and DNS Tunneling — Other Means for Revenue Generation and Obfuscation

Insikt Group’s report also details various hacking schemes and obfuscation techniques thought to be used by DPRK to generate revenue, evade sanctions, and even “to acquire nuclear-related knowledge banned by U.N. sanctions.”

“North Korean defectors have also talked extensively about the role that foreign countries play — many unknowingly — in the Kim regime’s cyber operations,” the group notes. “From the cyber perspective, third-party countries are used by the Kim regime to both train and host state-sponsored operators.”

Regarding malware, Pyongyang-linked hacker group “Lazarus” is one example of how the North Korean government may be leveraging fake “trading platforms” to generate funds. As news.Bitcoin.com reported last month, multiple fronts for phony trading platforms have been discovered, and Telegram groups were also leveraged to deliver sophisticated malware.

The Insikt Group report further details changes in North Korean opsec behavior, with the incorporation of domain name system (DNS) tunneling. “The original intent for DNS was to ease the lookups and associations of domains and IP addresses, not to secure that process,” the group elaborates. “As a result, and because DNS is so critical to a network’s operation, DNS ports (port 53 typically) are left open, and traffic is relatively unscrutinized.

DNS tunneling is when the DNS process is used not for a domain resolution, but for data transfer or tunnel between networks or devices.

The report maintains that though DNS tunneling is nothing new, North Korean users appear to have introduced the practice just recently, in mid-2019.

What do you think about the reports of North Korean actors mining monero more than bitcoin? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, fair use.

Did you know you can verify any unconfirmed Bitcoin transaction with our Bitcoin Block Explorer tool? Simply complete a Bitcoin address search to view it on the blockchain. Plus, visit our Bitcoin Charts to see what’s happening in the industry.

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How Often Are Top Privacy Coins and Mixers Actually Used? – A Look at XMR, DASH, and ZEC

10/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

How Often Are Top Privacy Coins and Mixers Actually Used? - A Look at XMR and Popular Protocols

As Bitcoin and crypto help everyday individuals to regain control over their money, and make trusting third parties unnecessary, it’s not surprising that privacy advocates have flocked to the space. While bitcoin’s ledger is openly viewable, privacy coins and privacy enhancing protocols are popular ways for value holders to ensure their sensitive financial info stays secure. Though a bit of a tricky subject thanks to the nature of privacy itself, this post aims to examine just how popular leading “privacy coins” such as Monero and Zcash, and obfuscation protocols like coin mixers, really are.

Also Read: How to Use a U2F Key to Secure Your Crypto Accounts

Privacy Coins and Obfuscation Services

There are a few ways users of crypto can aim for maximum privacy in transactions, and the most popular include cryptos built specifically for privacy, often called privacy coins, and mixing or coinjoin services which obfuscate transaction data, making it difficult for chain analysis to accurately determine the senders and receivers of the crypto. There are also private marketplaces and trading platforms like local.Bitcoin.com that make peer-to-peer transactions possible.

Popular privacy coins often have elements baked right into their codebases that enable obfuscation. Mixing, shuffling, and coin joining services and products like Wasabi Wallet, Samurai Wallet, Cash Shuffle, and the newly developed Cash Fusion help users even of more standard cryptos like BTC and BCH, gain an extra level of security in the form of privacy.

For obvious reasons, garnering stats on these coins and protocols can be tricky, but there are yet metrics that are useful in analyzing just how popular the various coins and services actually are in the market today.

Popular Privacy Coins – XMR, DASH, and ZEC

A quick trip to messari.io’s database shows stats for one of the most popular privacy coins, monero (XMR), which came about in 2014 as a fork of the bytecoin codebase. Monero is also the leader of the privacy pack by market capitalization, enjoying a near $1.5 billion valuation at press time.

Messari’s data shows that in the past 24 hours there have been 6,772 XMR transactions and the “real volume” for the same time period is $20,856,173.59. What we can’t see, however, is the number of active addresses for monero thanks to the obfuscation built into the code. Looking at a non-privacy focused network like BTC for contrast, there are 865,396 active addresses noted, and of course transaction volumes are much higher. Daily transaction volume nonetheless can help to establish the extent to which XMR is being used.

How Often Are Top Privacy Coins and Mixers Actually Used? - A Look at XMR, DASH, and ZEC — Though BTC transaction volume dwarfs that of XMR, monero has seen relatively steady usage since its inception. https://bitinfocharts.com

Another coin born in 2014 is DASH, which straddles the fence between being a privacy coin and a “mainstream” crypto thanks to its Privatesend capability. According to Messari, DASH has seen 21,696 transactions in the same 24 hour period as XMR’s 6,772, but of course these are not all private, so the comparison is difficult to make.

Where zcash is concerned, there (ZEC) is an attributed 12,703 active addresses and 3,329 transactions in 24 hours, about half of what Messari lists for XMR. However, ZEC’s 24 hour transaction volume is notable, with Messari listing the raw volume at $336,337,429.24, and the adjusted volume at $16,980,375.93. Zcash is another privacy coin that boasts a large market cap, weighing in at over $600 million.

Advocates of various privacy coins like monero sometimes make bold claims about widespread usage difficult to verify. Still, even though BTC seems the clear leader in darknet exchange, XMR does remain a staple and exercises notable prevalence compared to other coins. Possibly attesting to this prevalence, are numbers released from last summer’s hack of DNM marketplace Nightmare, in which the alleged “inside job” hacker released financial information listing the site’s various crypto balances:

Popular Mixing Services and Wallets

Popular privacy-focused Wasabi Wallet bills itself as “an open-source, non-custodial, privacy-focused Bitcoin wallet for Desktop, that implements trustless coin shuffling with mathematically provable anonymity – Chaumian CoinJoin.” The popular wallet has been downloaded over 117,000 times as of December 28, 2019. The Samourai mobile wallet for Android is also popular in hardcore privacy circles, and uses a slightly different coinjoin system called “Whirlpool,” but has enjoyed a more narrow user base than Wasabi, possibly owing to the fact that it is a mobile app and currently unavailable on iOS.

Wasabi has been downloaded over 100 000 times!
🔥🚀https://t.co/jWIZ8GoUl8 pic.twitter.com/O0jcM1e8Xs

— Wasabi Wallet (@wasabiwallet) December 23, 2019

Cashshuffle is a popular coin mixing protocol for bitcoin cash users, and since March 27, 2019 to present users have shuffled 209,360 BCH (~$92.8 million at current market prices). The same developers have also created a protocol called Cashfusion which seeks to give bitcoin cash transactions levels of privacy approaching those of coins like monero. Wasabi Wallet developer @nopara73 even commented in December on the project saying, “Cashfusion gives me goosebumps. It reminds me of the Knapsack paper.”

CashFusion gives me goosebumps. It reminds me of the Knapsack paper. Kudos for @MarkLundeberg @naomibrockwell for the great interview!https://t.co/8sHlvPhC1L

— nopara73 (@nopara73) December 19, 2019

Privacy a Mainstay for Crypto

As crypto and bitcoin become more and more mainstream, the roots of privacy dig deeper into the ground in proportion to efforts by regulators and centralized exchanges to KYC the scene into standardized, custodial oblivion. Though data on the subject can be murky and speculation about issues such as user base, market demand, and fluctuating hashrate abounds, crypto users can rest assured that Satoshi’s vision for a money not relying on third parties and nosy banks or regulators is alive and well, judging by the current climate and active use of privacy-focused options.

What do you think about the use of privacy coins and coin mixers? Are they really as popular as users say they are? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, fair use.

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Darknet Users Discuss the Connection Between DDoS Attacks and Exit Scams

01/02/2020 by Idelto Editor

During the last few weeks, a number of darknet markets (DNMs) like Dread and Empire have been attacked relentlessly with heavy DDoS attacks. Meanwhile, reports disclose that Apollon is allegedly pulling an exit scam in the same fashion as Nightmare Market did last year. Darknetstats.com details that Apollon remains online and is accepting bitcoin deposits while all vendors are locked out of the platform.

Also read: The Darknet Just Had One of Its Wildest Months Yet

Coincidental DDoS Attacks and a Possible Apollon Exit Scam

According to multiple reports, a bunch of DNMs are suffering from distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. News.Bitcoin.com reported on a variety of DNMs that were offline due to heavy DDoS assaults. In mid-December 2019, sites like Cannazon, The Hub Forum, Hydra, Monopoly, Dread, Darknet Live, and Empire were down according to the website Dark.fail. During the month of January 2020, a lot of marketplaces were downed again by being repeatedly ambushed with DDoS attacks. Dread and Empire are two DNMs that have been down often during the last two weeks. At the same time, darknetstats.com claims that the Apollon market might be in the midst of an exit scam.

Darknet Users Discuss the Connection Between DDoS Attacks and Exit Scams — For close to two months, several DNMs have been attacked by DDoS attacks and some people think they are connected with exit scams.

“Apollon Market established somewhere in 2018 is a market that offered drugs as well as fraud resources for the darknet users,” the darknetstats.com website detailed. “This is the market that is owned by a group known as ‘Market Spammers.’” The website’s blog author further added:

About five to six days ago we started receiving comments about users not getting their deposits added to their accounts. Although we get hundreds of comments every day from market admins and their competitors, we reject most of them and only approve those that are legit. The comments about deposits not getting added were real.

Apollon Vendors Are Locked Out, But Vendor Accounts Show They Are Active

Darknetstats.com alleges that all of Apollon’s vendors are locked out of their accounts and some accounts were set to “vacation mode.” This means the account listings “turned active to rake as much money from the users as they can.” An ostensible Apollon vendor dubbed ‘Shamanuk’ explained how the vacation mode switch happened. “My inactive vendor listings are going active,” Shamanuk stressed. Vendor accounts [are] locked [and] buyer accounts are free. So they generate money. This guys, is a classic exit scam — Please don’t buy there anymore.”

Reports also claim that the owners of Apollon might be connected with the Dread marketplace owners. Moreover, Apollon could also be tied to markets like Avaris, Whitehouse, Versus, Cannahome, and Monopoly. Coincidently, Apollon is the third market that has exit scammed while Dread, a Reddit-style forum, has been offline for 15 days.

The Market Spammers Gang Looks to Strike Again

Darknetstats.com thinks the Dread DDoS attacks and exit scams are connected. “Every time dread is offline, a market exit scams — It isn’t just a random market that goes offline, it’s their own market that exit scams, that’s because people can’t report the exit scam in its early stage to avoid getting less than expected returns,” darknetstats.com said. “You guys think it’s a coincidence? We don’t think so,” the website added. Additionally, two more markets (Avaris and Whitehouse) are being shilled heavily and are showing signs of being connected with the ‘Market Spammers’ gang.

“The conclusion is clear — We will see a powerful shilling in favor of Avaris Market and everyone will be asked to join Avaris (and Whitehouse too) on Dread,” the website’s blog post concluded. “The accounts that will do the shilling can be easily identified by experts but new users will definitely fall for this trap and will join this market and get scammed again. Our advice will be to stay away at all costs from the markets mentioned above.”

Empire and Dread remain practically inaccessible. Heavy DDoS attacks began against them when Apollon’s exit scam began.

The scam is ongoing. Apollon remains online and is accepting Bitcoin deposits while all vendors are locked out. Nightmare pulled the same scam last year.

— dark.fail (@DarkDotFail) January 30, 2020

Besides darknetstats.com, on social media sites like Twitter and the Reddit forum r/darknet, a number of vendors and DNM customers are discussing the Apollon situation fervently. One individual on the forum r/darknet told DNM users not to stress over Apollon. “Ready to give up on darknet markets? — Don’t — One bad Apollon doesn’t spoil the whole bunch,” he wrote.

Who do you think could be responsible for the darknet’s DDoS attacks? What do you think about the alleged Apollon market exit scam? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Apollon Logo, Fair Use, and Pixabay.

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Monopoly Is a Tiny Darknet Market With Big Aspirations

18/01/2020 by Idelto Editor

There’s a certain irony in the smallest market on the darknet being named Monopoly. With less than 150 listings, the monero-friendly Monopoly Market is anything but. What this tiny darknet market (DNM) lacks in size, however, it makes up for in spirit. The cypherpunk ethos permeates this nascent market where sovereign individuals can exercise their right to peacefully transact.

Also read: White House Market Wants to Become the Darknet’s Toughest DNM

Take a Chance on Monopoly

Monero darknet markets are all the rage right now. While the XMR-oriented White House Market is going strong, Monopoly is playing little league for now, with a trade volume that’s unlikely to have law enforcement throwing all they got at it. Darknet markets lead a precarious existence, however, and all it takes is a takedown, exit scam, or prolonged DDoS of the competition for an unfancied DNM to be catapulted to the major league.

Don’t write Monopoly off just yet, then, even if its listings are few, its vendors fewer still, and in its latest newsletter the site admin expressed frustration at the reticence of DNM users to choose monero over bitcoin. Acknowledging that BTC sales far exceed XMR on the darknet, the admin wrote “people just do not want to go to the effort of using monero … personal use buyers could not care less, so we have a decision to make. Do we forget our morals and why we created Monopoly to begin with and introduce bitcoin payments to boost sales and our revenue?”

The answer to that has proven to be yes, but to assert that Monopoly has thereby abandoned its morals would be doing the site a disservice. All evidence suggests that this is a DNM committed to doing the right thing, namely safeguarding its vendors without inconveniencing its users. BTC is now a payment option, but XMR remains the default choice on Monopoly.

Roll the Dice and Make a Monopoly Purchase

To see how Monopoly compares to White House Market, as well as Empire and the numerous other DNMs out there, I gave it a spin. The first thing that strikes you about the market is the means by which you must access it: after finding the link on dark.fail, I was led to a splash page that instructs “Find the two highlighted pieces of text below … Simply join them together and insert .onion at the end to form your unique market link.” As security measures go, this one’s certainly innovative. Pretty soon, DNMs will be asking you to recite the complete works of Shakespeare backwards while standing on your head in the name of opsec and DDoS reduction. I balk at clicking past a cookie notice on the clearnet, but on the darknet, I’ll go the extra mile.

Monopoly has taken a neat approach to providing rotating mirrors with a static page. I do not think the actor scraping mirrors and attacking them (Gustav?) will bother grabbing these mirrors. pic.twitter.com/x6piUktpFf

— Caleb (@5auth) January 16, 2020

“Welcome to Monopoly,” beams the homepage proper, “the first true walletless/userless experience intended to provably rid the ecosystem from malicious exit scams pulled by markets. Built by vendors, for consumers.” Any DNM can talk the talk, but at the end of the day, there’s still a degree of trust required to trade on it. I’m inclined to believe Monopoly though, not least because with 5% commission on its current sales, there’s little in its community chest with which to exit scam.

A Pleasure to Play, a Pain to Pay

In Barry Schwartz’ 2004 book “The Paradox of Choice,” the psychologist argues that eliminating excess consumer choice can reduce anxiety for shoppers. On Monopoly Market, there’s no such problem: with so few listings, it’s a case of pick your preferred shipping country and choose from a handful of options. I am okay with this, even though it would be nice to see a greater selection, for the site’s sake and for its users’. The vendors aren’t so ill served, at least, as most of them ply their trade on multiple DNMs.

A lot of care has gone into creating Monopoly Market, which is more than just another DNM clone. The site loads quickly and its listings feature vendor badges and other info that helps buyers make an informed choice. This includes the amount of items in stock, the number of views per listing, and the number of open orders. There’s also a leaderboard showing the most popular vendors on the site. The coolest thing of all, though, is that you don’t need to create an account to place an order. That means no username, no password, and no trail of breadcrumbs leading back to your door.

My only gripe with Monopoly come after paying for an item, having first encrypted my details using PGP in the usual manner. After 10 block confirmations, buyers are prompted to click a button confirming that payment was sent, and must enter the monero TXID and the TXKEY pertaining to the transaction. I have the former but not the latter because that information is not supplied in Cake, the monero light mobile wallet I used. Obtaining this calls for using the full monero desktop wallet. To solve the problem, I’m obliged to upload a screenshot of the wallet transaction and await a manual check. Monopoly does recommend using the full monero desktop wallet in its tutorial, but there’s no guarantee first-time users will see this before they buy, and moreover it doesn’t explain the perils of paying with a light wallet.

May Monopoly and Its Kind Reign Supreme

With a couple of kinks ironed out, Monopoly has the potential to become one of the best DNMs on the darknet when it comes to balancing opsec with convenience. Whatever the fate of the market, its accountless and depositless system is to be admired and emulated. We need more darknet markets that are willing to innovate and protect the privacy of their users. Because if there’s one thing that we’ve consistently learned over the past decade, it’s that when faced with a choice between convenience and security, web users will invariably pick the easy option. Enforced privacy should be the default when using darknet markets. White House and Monopoly Market aren’t perfect, but they’re a step in the right direction. May they and their kind thwart LE and live long.

Do you think monero will gain ground over bitcoin on the darknet? Let us know in the comments section below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock.

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