Gal Vallerius Arrested For Dealing Drugs On A Dark Web Marketplace

A darknet is a portion of routed, allocated IP space, which does not run any services and thus whatever traffic arrives at such IP dark spaces are almost always undesired as it has no active hosts. A darknet marketplace is a commercial website that operated through darknets such as Tor and I2P.

Gal Vallerius, who also goes by his more popular nickname, “Oxymonster” had been involved in a Dark Web marketplace called Dream Market, and recently has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for charges of conspiracy, distributing drugs and money laundering against him. The origin of his nickname is owing to his experience in carrying out narcotics deals on the marketplace, which includes sales for opioid, heroin and cocaine. Users of the site are allowed to buy and sell illegal drugs in Europe and United States and have the valid option of remaining anonymous. This thus creates the perfect platform to serve as a black market for many users.

Valleruis who participates in beard growing competitions was on his way to one such event in the United States when he was detained at the airport, for questioning regarding his laptop. On delving deeper, the authorities found the TOR browser, login credentials for “senior moderator” on Dream Market, a role which he fulfils and also a stash Bitcoin tokens worth 500,000 USD. He has since then cut a plea deal and has been assisting federal authorities, in investigating and eventually taking down the other dark we dealers.

A statement released during the trial of the accused said:

“By virtue of the size and scope of the marketplace … it was the intent of the operators and vendors on Dream Market to distribute more than 450 kilos of cocaine, 90 kilos of heroin and 45 kilos of methamphetamine.”

Rishma Banerjee

Rishma is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in International Relations and has a special place in her life for sifting through all sorts of random trivia, thank you very much.