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Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

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Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#151

Post by sigmaprimus »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #147
sigmaprimus wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on your measure of what makes them "most or least worst" you may be correct, but I disagree with the premise that whether or not their motives are virtuous makes a difference. The fact is judges rule over the system and that in itself make them the worst of the bunch, and actually the fact that they have less incentives yet continue to enable such a broken system to hurt people might be the best reason they are…

They don't have the incentive to ruin people's lives to game their performance metrics (like prosecutors do). They don't have incentive to make much to do over nothing to justify their budget (like cops do). They don't have incentive to keep people in the system as long as possible to milk money from them and the state (like the prison system does). They don't have incentive to perpetuate the war on drugs to sell cra…

I would concede that your arguments are all valid, unfortunately if we look at where most judges were employed before becoming judges the majority were the best-worst of the people in "every other group I mentioned". I think we will have to agree to disagree on this one, but I do appreciate your well thought out argument.

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#152

Post by jfaat »

sigmaprimus wrote: post #51
omeid2 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The war on drug has to be one of the top contributors and financiers of crime and criminal gangs. Imagine a world where criminal gangs don't have access to the money they make through drugs and a government that doesn't have to spend huge amount of money on drug laws enforcement because drug trafficking would be much less lucrative in the existence of legal access and you get fewer and very cash-strapped drug gangs,…

The war on drugs is also a big contributor to the LEGAL gangs such as police,distric attornies, defence attorneys, prison officials and worst of all judges. Definitely an industrial economic complex similar to the Military Industrial Complex.

The prison industrial complex is a thing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison%E2%80%93industrial_comp...

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#154

Post by perlmutterlabs »

krageon wrote: post #125
perlmutterlabs wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Taking a guess: ML is just too good. Don't forget, it's also a signal to leave surveillance areas, eg "last seen driving into the desert". Any kind of outlier behavior is PART of the detection model ... that's where probabilistic models gain leverage, in fact ...

You are vastly overestimating your adversary here.

This kind of statement is hard to argue, as incentive to conceal technological ability is likely baked into the game. So then what's your threat model?

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#155

Post by perlmutterlabs »

njharman wrote: post #77
perlmutterlabs wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it's a great story, but machine vision + machine learning + surveillance could pull the rug out from the dropgangs market in a second. But really, other than this fatal flaw, it's a great narrative of the internet spilling into and interfacing with analog markets

London is the most surveilled public space on the planet with full access for law enforcement. Somehow crime still happens there. Technology is not a magic bullet. It also is also neutral and does not choose sides. Crime will exist for as long as it is profitable. There's even crime and black markets in highly secure, structured environments like prison. "Arms Race" between law and outlaw will continue.

Completely agree. This is how power works.

Note that I said "could" in the original post ... Type 1. Some things "could" be with enough power backing them, Type 2. While others could never be regardless of power backing (eg engineering limits like quantum computing, or even organizational limits like the petro-bolivar?).

With the right backing - political, resources, talent - surveillance tech "could" quickly squash dropgangs, so it belongs to Type 1. (Btw, where talent goes is a key determinant.)

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#156

Post by PascLeRasc »

monotone666 wrote: post #37

Dead drops can’t compete with USPS. They require a court order to open your package and even then can’t charge anyone with possession. All they do is send you a “love letter” and people have reported receiving future packages just fine. Millions of people use dark net marketplaces. The war on drugs has fueled their growth and more serious crimes like identity theft have benefited from it.

Maybe dropgangs read Paul Graham's "Do things that don't scale" advice.

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#157

Post by atemerev »

jacquesm wrote: post #115
atemerev wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People from more or less politically stable countries like the US are very naive in not considering what can happen to the best of governments overnight. People from Europe have this sort of... experience. Most of us know that trusting the government with our lives is not a good idea.

> People from more or less politically stable countries like the US I would have agreed with that assessment in the past but in the present I really can't.

Come on, if your country can handle _this_ president without collapsing immediately, your political system is really well designed!

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#158

Post by paulie_a »

monotone666 wrote: post #37

Dead drops can’t compete with USPS. They require a court order to open your package and even then can’t charge anyone with possession. All they do is send you a “love letter” and people have reported receiving future packages just fine. Millions of people use dark net marketplaces. The war on drugs has fueled their growth and more serious crimes like identity theft have benefited from it.

I haven't ordered drugs via USPS but have ordered illegal items. I received a letter from customs basically saying "we are not accusing you of anything, but don't do it again.". I received the new package in a couple weeks and the letter 6 months later. This wasn't even a dark market, just a regular website that takes visa.

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#159

Post by kakarot »

mirimir wrote: post #89
kakarot wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, it's ~clueless customers and low-level distributors who'll most likely get pwned. INTERPOL has made some large busts in the past, but afaik it always has come down to failure to maintain proper OPSEC. There's also the issue of possible directives in the future to prosecute customers en masse after major domestic busts using backlogged USPS analytics. As traffic obfuscation methods continuously improve, the…

Well, they could end the drug war, and then crime wouldn't be an issue.

That would also fix a cascade of other major global issues.

Re: Dropgangs, or the future of darknet markets

#160

Post by mywittyname »

omeid2 wrote: post #39
monotone666 wrote: post #37

Dead drops can’t compete with USPS. They require a court order to open your package and even then can’t charge anyone with possession. All they do is send you a “love letter” and people have reported receiving future packages just fine. Millions of people use dark net marketplaces. The war on drugs has fueled their growth and more serious crimes like identity theft have benefited from it.

The war on drug has to be one of the top contributors and financiers of crime and criminal gangs. Imagine a world where criminal gangs don't have access to the money they make through drugs and a government that doesn't have to spend huge amount of money on drug laws enforcement because drug trafficking would be much less lucrative in the existence of legal access and you get fewer and very cash-strapped drug gangs,…

There are plenty of illegal activities which can be used by gangs to generate revenue. If certain drugs are decriminalized, they still have theft, fencing, prostitution, sex trafficking, intimidation, computer crimes, etc.
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