23-year-old man accused of running $100 million online narcotics marketplace


Federal authorities have arrested a 23-year-old Taiwanese national and charged him with running an online market that sold $100 million worth of illicit narcotics, including fentanyl, cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin, LSD, and ketamine.

The authorities said that for almost four years, Rui-Siang Lin operated and owned the Incognito Market, an online marketplace on the dark web that users worldwide visited to buy and sell illegal narcotics. The marketplace facilitated transactions with many of the same features provided by legitimate e-commerce sites, including buyer and user registration, branding, advertising, and customer service.

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Source: ArsTechnica


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