Founded in 2015, Hydra sold illegal drugs but also stolen credit card data, counterfeit currency and fake identity documents, masking the identities of those involved using the Tor encryption network
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Berlin, Germany: German police said Tuesday they have taken down Russian-language illegal darknet marketplace Hydra, the largest such network in the world, and seized bitcoins worth 23 million euros ($25 million).
Founded in 2015, Hydra sold illegal drugs but also stolen credit card data, counterfeit currency and fake identity documents, masking the identities of those involved using the Tor encryption network.
The marketplace had around 17 million customer accounts and more than 19,000 vendor accounts, according to the BKA federal police.
"The Hydra market was probably the illegal marketplace with the highest turnover worldwide", with sales amounting to at least 1.23 billion euros in 2020 alone, the BKA said in a statement.
Investigators have taken control of Hydra's servers in Germany and the marketplace has been "shut down", the BKA said.