Darknet Market Timeline
A chronological record of every major darknet market closure from the birth of Silk Road in 2011 to Hydra's seizure in 2022.
The original darknet market, pioneered the escrow model. Ross Ulbricht arrested in a San Francisco library. Relaunched as Silk Road 2.0 by former staff, then also seized in November 2014.
Read full history →One of the few darknet markets to shut down cleanly, allowing users to withdraw funds. Operators cited a potential deanonymization attack on Tor as the reason for closure.
Read full history →One of the earliest large-scale darknet market exit scams. Operators Verto and Kimble disappeared in March 2015 with an estimated $12M in Bitcoin held in user escrow accounts.
Read full history →The largest darknet market of its era, processing $600K–$800K/day before seizure. Operator Alexandre Cazes arrested in Thailand and found dead in his cell 1 week later.
Read full history →Dutch police secretly ran Hansa for a month after taking it over, harvesting 10,000+ buyer credentials and shipping addresses. Considered one of the most sophisticated LE operations in darknet history.
Read full history →One of the longest-running darknet markets. Announced voluntary closure citing 'technical issues'. The closure is widely attributed to DDoS extortion rather than LE pressure.
Read full history →Exit scam followed immediately by operator arrests. The moderators began slowly draining funds while European police were already closing in. All three operators were arrested in Germany.
Read full history →One of the largest markets following Dream Market's closure in 2019. Announced shutdown in August 2019 citing sustained DoS attacks, but the abrupt closure with no user fund recovery led most analysts to classify it as an exit scam.
Read full history →The largest Finnish-language darknet market, also known as Silkkitie. Seized by Finnish Customs as part of Operation DisrupTor's precursor investigations, with coordination from Europol and the DEA.
Read full history →A European darknet market with Italian operators. Disappeared in late 2019 in what is believed to be an exit scam, followed by the arrest of associated administrators by Italian authorities.
Read full history →The largest exit scam in darknet market history. Operators disappeared with an estimated $30M in user funds after 3 years of operation. ~72-hour DDoS preceded the exit.
Read full history →One of the most security-conscious markets of its era: Monero-only payments, mandatory PGP for all communications, and no JavaScript. Closed voluntarily in October 2021 after growing to become one of the largest markets globally.
Read full history →A market known for its multi-signature escrow system and vendor-friendly policies. Closed voluntarily in December 2021, returning all user funds in an orderly shutdown.
Read full history →The largest darknet market in the world at the time of its seizure. Europol-led operation in January 2021 took down the platform, arrested the alleged operator near the German-Danish border, and seized over 20 servers in Moldova and Ukraine.
Read full history →A short-lived darknet market that disappeared in 2021 with user funds. The operators vanished without announcement, leaving buyers and vendors unable to recover escrowed balances.
Read full history →The largest Russian-language darknet market in history. Served Russia/CIS exclusively. Brought down in a joint German-US operation that seized 543 BTC and servers in Germany.
Read full history →A cannabis-only darknet market that operated for four years and closed voluntarily in November 2022, giving users advance notice and time to withdraw all funds — one of the cleaner exits in darknet market history.
Read full history →A successor to the original Dark0de hacking forum, relaunched as a full darknet market in 2021. Operated for roughly one year before voluntarily closing in 2022.
Read full history →A well-regarded market known for its invite-only vendor system and strong security practices. Closed voluntarily in May 2022 after an XSS vulnerability was discovered that potentially exposed server infrastructure — operators warned users and returned funds.
Read full history →A Monero-only market that vanished in early 2023 without warning. The suspected operator, Milomir Desnica, was arrested in Austria in November 2023 on US drug trafficking charges.
Read full history →