Operation Disruptor was a dark web take-down in the drug trafficking sector. Hackers and other cybercriminals should pay attention as authorities catch up.

We are currently in the “Wild West” era of the internet, but that is slowly coming to a close. Inch by painstaking inch, governments around the world are putting rules, regulations and laws into place with consequences for breaking those rules. Those consequences only matter if you get caught, though, which has been the biggest problem for authorities worldwide. That is slowly changing as governments and policing agencies catch up to cybercriminals and track them down.

A prime example of this happened recently, when a massive, global dark web take-down was announced. Operation Disruptor started in 2019, but on September 22, a global effort in the war on drugs took a giant leap forward. There were 179 arrests spanning six countries. During those arrests, 500 kilograms of drugs and $6.5 million in cash and cryptocurrency were confiscated.

The process began in May 2019 when Wall Street Market, an underground bazaar, was seized by German police. This is when international authorities received the necessary information to tackle the dark web drug trade. From Wired.com:

“It provided us with all the information which led to the identification of those arrested today,” says Europol press officer Claire Georges. “We collated the information and then we sent out what we call intelligence packages to all the concerned countries. Basically it’s information or documents where we say, look, we know this person in your country has done this, you may want to open an investigation.” Georges says also that there are more arrests to come.

While announced as a package today, the arrests in the US have trickled through over the last several months. In a press conference Tuesday morning, DEA acting administrator Timothy Shea specifically called out Arden McCann, allegedly known as RCQueen, DRXanax, and other aliases across numerous dark web markets. Arrested earlier this year, McCann allegedly shipped over 10 2kilograms of fentanyl and over 300,000 counterfeit Xanax pills every month.

“In some ways this is just the perfect-storm combination of traditional criminal activity of all shapes and sizes merging with this more sophisticated technology,” FBI director Christopher Wray said at Tuesday’s press conference. “But the point of today’s announcement is it doesn’t matter where you go to try to do it or how you try to hide it, we’re coming for you.”

While the impact of this take-down remains to be seen, and whether Operation Disruptor will, in fact, make a dent on the drug trade is still not known, the situation illustrates what the authorities are capable of doing. Especially when international governments work together and communicate globally. The effects of this incident will prove to governments that they CAN work together, and that when they do, everyone wins.

This incident involved drug traffickers on the dark web, but it should serve as a warning to cybercriminals and other nefarious elements who also use the dark web. The authorities are catching up. They’re learning. The laws and compliance bodies are continually updating policies, laws and consequences. They may not catch you right away, the legal process is always slower than the criminals, but they will find you. Especially if international governments continue to work together, that’s where we’ll see the biggest impact going forward.