A libertarian’s dream: The creation of The Silk Road (Part 1/3) | Forensic Files

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with audiobooks [Music] our episodes deal with serious and often distressing incidents if you feel at
anytime you need support please contact your local crisis center for suggested phone numbers for confidential support
please see the show notes for this episode on your app or on our website the Silk Road was an ancient network of
trade routes that started in China in the second century BC via a combination of roads and sea routes goods like silk
paper and spices were transported from the producers in Asia to markets in Europe eventually it wasn't just goods
that were traded there were also ideas customs religions and even diseases the Silk Road expanded throughout different
continents and civilizations for several centuries they connected Asia Europe Africa and the Middle East a marketplace
across the world two major expansions can be traced back to the Silk Road one of these was the introduction of
Buddhism into China the second was the Black Death vermin accompanied some of the goods along the Silk Road and upon
the vermin were fleas these fleas carried the bubonic plague also known as the Black Death and as the fleas entered
Europe so did the plague it's estimated that in the 14th century between 100 and
125 million people died from the Black Death reducing the world's population by somewhere between 30 and 60 percent the
Silk Road is recognized as the very first true globalization that the world experienced the free trade of goods and
the passing of ideas and customs from one society to another it changed everything there would be many centuries
later that a very different kind of marketplace would open up on a modern platform a new trade route using the
same name Silk Road [Music] Ross William Albert who was born on March 27th 1984 in Austin Texas from a
young age who is described as social curious kind helpful and resourceful he joined the Boy Scouts and got to the
rank of Eagle Scout just like his father had after school Ross earned a full scholarship to study physics at the
University of Texas in Dallas he fell in love with a girl at University and at the time of his graduation in 2006 he
proposed to her but his girlfriend confessed that she'd been seeing various other men on the side and all plans for
a wedding were called off Ross returned to his hometown and tried to figure out what to do with his life he tried out
for The Amazing Race television show with his sister and when that didn't work out he decided to continue with his
studies he applied for a master's degree at Pennsylvania State University and once again he got a full scholarship his
focus was on material science and engineering up to that point Ross was deeply interested in
mathematics science and nature but at Penn State his interest shifted dramatically he joined a club that
explored a subject that fascinated him to no end libertarianism [Music] libertarianism is based on the concept
that everything a person does should be up to them not anyone else essentially it advocates minimal government
intervention in the lives of its citizens Ross was especially interested in the theories of Ludwig von Mises into the
Austrian School of Economics which support the view that people are their own rulers and don't need a government
to regulate them Ross adopted a very different lifestyle because of this new interest he moved
into a basement because he got it for free and he got his clothes for free from a friend that handled a secondhand
store Ross's idea was to see if he could live with nothing more than the necessities a
less materialistic life Ross was also a part of other clubs at Penn State one of
them was an African drumming club during one of the club's get-togethers he met a
fellow student by the name of Julia Julia was 18 years old at the time six years younger than Ross Julia and Ross's
time together is outlined in the book American kingpin by Nick Bilton she remembered seeing Ross and thinking he
looked homeless with his torn up clothes and unkempt beard Ross struck up a conversation with Julia
and one week later they saw each other again this time Ross had shaved his beard and was dressed more presentable
II he asked Julia out and she agreed they went out for dinner after which they ended up back at Ross's basement
where Julia saw how he lived when she asked him about his less materialistic lifestyle
Ross explained to that he was part of a libertarian Club and he was experimenting Julia didn't quite
understand what libertarianism was and Ross explained the basic concept he used drugs as an example anything a person
decides to pudding to their body should be their decision into no one else's especially not the government's
Russ's fascination with libertarianism continued and he participated in a debate about whether drugs should be
legalized or not Ross defended the position that every person should have the free will to
decide whether to take trucks he said that many problems would stop if drugs were legalized such as violence and turf
wars an issue of poor quality drugs being cut with poison and dangerous chemicals Ross's belief was that if
drugs were legal that would be safer for everyone after graduating from University Ross decided that he had no
interest in pursuing a career in science what he wanted to do was become an entrepreneur and develop his own
business for a couple of years had been thinking of ways to put his libertarianism ideals into action the
closest had come was the design of a c-step a permanent dwelling based at sea outside the regulation of any government
as much as he liked the idea it would be hard to turn into a reality but Ross found a workaround he'd always been a
keen computer user even when he decided to live a less materialistic life he always had his laptop close by most of
his income came from computer generated work he'd search for odd jobs on Craigslist and he'd entered a
partnership with a friend to run a used book website called good wagon books Ross was always on his laptop and it was
through his computer that he found a way to turn his ceased ed idea into reality at the end of 2009
Ross started talking with someone online that had the pseudonym arto Ross found Otto on a forum on a libertarian website
and they started chatting via email Ross wondered if he could create his free trade market idea on the internet and
make it untraceable outside the control and regulations of the government he discussed his idea with Otto and our
host holding that there was a way to create a website that couldn't be traced by the government and the way to do it
was through tour tor allows you to enter the Deep Web the Deep Web is essentially the Internet in
its entirety the Deep Web is a part of the internet that is difficult to access no one really knows how much content is
available in the Deep Web but a lot remains hidden there you can't use a search engine to get there you can't use
the normal web browser and you can't just type in a normal web address in order to access the Deep Web you do it
through tor which is software that works as a web browser Taal was originally created by the US
Navy its function was to protect communication inside the government they wanted a way to communicate that
couldn't be traced so tall was created as art I explained to ross tor provides anonymity once you went at all you can't
be traced because your IP address and browsing history are hidden an IP address is basically the identity of
your computer whenever you connect to the internet your computer is given a unique IP address if someone knows your
IP address then you can be uniquely identified and it may be possible to determine your location when you answer
the Deep Web you need to know where you are going it isn't like browsing Google it helps
if you know the exact name and address of the site where you want to go and they aren't regular web addresses either
almost every site in the Deep Web uses mostly a random set of letters and numbers for its address so it
complicates matters even further whilst the Deep Web has a reputation for being a place only used by hackers hitmen and
child pornographers there are many legitimate reasons for its use some of those are privacy to avoid websites
giving your data away to marketing companies people living in countries whose governments censor the Internet
can use it journalists use it to speak to sources and whistleblowers to assure anonymity Ross thought the Deep Web
sounded like the perfect place to create an anonymous website first free-trade marketplace idea but he still had a
problem even if he created a website where every person that entered was untraceable
he still needed an anonymous way of paying if people had to pay with credit cards or PayPal they could be easily
traced and the whole point would be lost Ross asked taro about this our dough couldn't provide him with a straight up
solution but he did tell him a story the story was the plot of a novel called a lodging of wayfaring men in the novel
there is a group of libertarians that want complete freedom from the government so they create a virtual
society and create their own digital currency the online society grows quickly to the point where the
government becomes afraid that the virtual society will destroy the norms of the actual society they live in Ross
found the story interesting and inspiring but he didn't know how to create his own digital currency it
wasn't long until he found his solution though almost at the same time that Ross
was having these discussions with Ardo about the Deep Web Bitcoin was being created
bitcoin is a decentralized cryptocurrency a digital currency that exists only online like Ross the creator
of Bitcoin someone going by the name or pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto wanted to get
the banks and the government out of the way so that people could freely make transfers of money with one another
Nakamoto started working on the creation of Bitcoin in 2007 and in 2008 the u.s.
suffered its biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s Wall Street crashed and the banks
essentially lost everything collapsing completely shortly after that happened Satoshi Nakamoto declared that a new
currency was coming Nakamoto posted on an online forum on February 11 2009 on the peer-to-peer foundation website
quote the root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that's required to make it work the central
bank must be trusted not to debase the currency but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that
trust banks must be trusted to hold our money and transfer it electronically but
they lend it out in waves of credit bubbles with barely a fraction in reserve we have to trust them with our
privacy trust them not to let identity thieves drain our accounts their massive overhead costs make micro payments
impossible nakamoto said that bitcoin would solve all of these problems the transfer of
bitcoin is made between one person and another no third participant or central figure is required to controller there
are no taxes and no credits nakamoto's idea from the beginning was to make something straight forward a transfer
without all the hassles that most currencies have nowadays a transfer that would be as simple as a person having
something and giving it to another bitcoin managed to be exactly that bitcoin was exactly what ross needed not
only was bitcoin created with similar ideals as his own but it worked in a straightforward way a person could buy
bitcoins and manage them anonymously it's sort of like cash for the internet it's hard to trace cash back to the
person who spent it when Bitcoin first appeared in 2010 ross had been working tirelessly in the creation of his
website for almost the year he taught himself programming and coding and made the website from scratch he didn't want
anyone else to know about the site because the first thing he wanted to saw there was drugs
the only person he'd shared anything with up to that moment was Richard a friend of his from the University of
Texas Richard was a programmer and even though Russ had tried to learn as much as possible
he was only self-taught so when he got stuck with coding he caught Richard when he shared the coding with Richard he
told him it was for a top-secret project and he didn't want any questions asked about it
Richard respected the request and simply fixed the problem having no idea what it
was for Ross did eventually share his website with his girlfriend Julia after they started their relationship at Penn
State University Russ and Julia remained together through thick and thin Julia didn't share Ross's passion for
libertarianism but she respected his views when Ross finished his master's degree and decided to become an
entrepreneur Julia left Penn State with him and together they rented an apartment in Austin Texas his hometown
while Ross did several jobs Julia had her own photography business Vivian's muse their apartment was her photography
studio in November 2010 Ross blindfolded Julia she didn't understand what was happening but allowed him to take her he
led her to his pickup truck and they drove for a while before coming to a stop Ross led Julia by her shoulders and
when he finally took off her blindfold all she saw was darkness she realized the only source of light was a small
window in the place seems small and had a strong odor Julia was confused but soon understood what was going on when
Ross showed her a large shelf that had long trays of mushrooms magic mushrooms Ross showed her rage of the trace and
explained that this was the place he'd been disappearing to recently the place was a small apartment he rented that was
downstairs from the landlord's house Ross was able to rent it without too many questions getting asked he said he
couldn't keep it to himself any longer he had to tell someone and the blindfold was for Julia's own protection
what his planning was big and if he got caught he didn't want her involved after
testing the quality of his mushrooms Ross felt it was time in January 2011 the website was ready to launch he'd
done the coding the programming the design and had created the first product or so the choice of mushrooms to be the
first thing to sell wasn't a surprising one Ross was a pro drug advocate his drugs of choice were marijuana
acid and psychedelics and he believed that if he was caught selling mushrooms he would receive a lesser penalty than
if he was caught dealing heroin or cocaine [Music] the last thing Ross needed for his
website was a name at one point he was leaning towards underground brokers but at the last moment he had a change of
heart and went for a name that described not only the market but also emphasized
the ideas behind it that name was Silk Road when Ross launched the website he shared it with only one person his
girlfriend Julia he'd already showed her the magic mushrooms and had given her a
very quick summary of the websites idea so when he opened the site for business it made sense to show it to Julia he
trusted her as outlined in the book American kingpin by Nick Bilton Ross gave Julia a step-by-step guide on how
to enter Silk Road once they had toured the unloaded on Julia's MacBook Ross typed in the following address see yd g
c c YK y XP b u 6u z dot onion this was silk road's web address because it was on the Deep Web there was a bunch
of random letters and numbers and ended with dot onion instead of calm now but they were inside Silk Road Brussels our
Giulia time to take it all in she saw the web site was mostly a blank page with the name Silk Road written in green
along with the green logo of a camel the camel was a reference to the actual Silk
Road merchants would travel through the Silk Road routes on camels because many were located in deserts and places with
very dry weather but other than seeing that Julia wasn't too sure how to navigate the web site so Ross continued
explaining Ross acted like a regular buyer and went to one of the links inside the site the red drugs once
inside the drugs classification there was another link that red psychedelics Ross clicked on that link and there were
his magic mushrooms the first and only product available on Silk Road at that point there was a picture showing what
they look like in the price Julia asked Ross how she would go about buying the mushrooms and Ross explained to Bitcoin
he gave her the example of buying tokens in an arcade he told her she'd go to the
arcade and pay for tokens which she could then use to play in the arcade and there would be no way of knowing which
tokens she used Julia understood the concept but wasn't sure where to buy Bitcoin so Ross went to a Bitcoin
exchange site and asked for her credit card he entered her details and just like
that she had big coins to use the explanation seemed simple enough to Julia but she'd received a guided explanation
from Ross the creator of the site so their next question was how would anyone else who entered the site know what to
do Ross showed her how to step-by-step guide that had written for that purpose so that buyers and sellers wouldn't get
lost the last question on Julia's mind was how would anyone else know about the existence of Silk Road
Ross answered Julie our by showing her two posts he'd written on different sites the first one was opposed he'd
written on January 27 2011 he'd gone to a magic mushrooms forum called the shrew
Marie and registered an account under the pseudonym Altoid after registering he posted the following message quote I
came across this website called Silk Road it's a tor hidden service that claims to allow you to buy and sell
anything online anonymously on thinking of buying off it but wanted to see if anyone here had heard of it and could
recommend it I found it through Silk Road 420 wordpress.com which if you have a tor browser directs you to the real
site let me know what you think Ross played the part of being someone who was casually browsing the Deep Web and came
across the site by accident so he wouldn't be known as the Creator but at the same time he left every piece of
information one needed to enter Silk Road as outlined in the book Silk Road by Eileen Ormsby the link to the
WordPress site that he created located on the regular internet redirected people to the actual link in the Deep
Web for anyone using a tor browser in the WordPress site he created Ross used the name Silk Road 420 the number 420
refers to April 20th the official day of marijuana when a person entered the WordPress site
a message appeared saying this is not Silk Road but you're close then there was a guide on how to download tor and
access the actual Silk Road site on the Deep Web Ross made a second web post about Silk
Road two days later January 29th 2011 this second post was on a website called Bitcoin talk talk
Bitcoin was very new at this point and people were discussing the viability of it and its possible uses one use the
Saint attractive was to pay for things on the Deep Web the particular forum thread that Ross posted in was a
discussion about using Bitcoin to buy and sell heroin Ross's post phret quote what an awesome
thread you guys have a ton of great ideas has anyone seen Silk Road yet it's kind of like an anonymous amazon.com I
don't think they have heroin there but they are selling other stuff they basically use Bitcoin and taught to
broker anonymous transactions those not familiar with tor can go to Silk Road 4/20 dot wordpress.com for instructions
on how to access the dot Onion so let me know what you guys think these two forum
posts by Ross attracted people to Silk Road on its opening day however no one bought anything but it wasn't long
before they were soon not only were people visiting Silk Road to buy and sell they themselves were promoting the
site chatter started to appear on forums and even on one online radio show on the
radio show the host stated that 28 transactions had occurred on Silk Road in the first two weeks there were thirty
listings of different drugs and 151 registered users Silk Road continued to grow into less
than one month later on April 11 2011 the number of registered users had grown to one thousand the way a transaction
was made was that the buyer would enter Silk Road see the products available and
choose what they wanted they'd add it to a car exactly like you would on any normal web site like Amazon then the
buyer would check out and make their purchase once the purchase was made the funds of the buyer would be retained by
Silk Road in an escrow account until the buyer was satisfied with the purchase once the drugs got to the buyers house
or other place of choice they released the funds from the escrow account to the seller the way Silk Road made money was
by acting as the third person in the transaction because the transaction was made through Silk Road and the funds
were retained for the safety of both buyer and seller Silk Road charged the Commission for its services at the time
the Commission was six point two three percent per transaction one of the biggest breakthroughs Silk Road achieved
was allowing people to get drugs delivered to their home like any other online purchase each seller had a
different method of hiding drugs so they wouldn't get detected by the authorities
some were much better at it than others Ross's method for his magic mushrooms was to first wrap them up in a plastic
ziplock bag then he put a second wrapping on them from his good wagon books online store so the drug delivery
was disguised as a book lastly he'd printing out the name and address of the buyer rather than handwrite it he
believed this would look more businesslike and professional and thus would attract less attention by April
2011 Ross was starting to make money in order to get Silk Road running including the creation of the magic
mushrooms the rent of the apartment to grow them the cost of creating the website and everything in between Ross
had invested seventeen thousand dollars kidney I made that money back and had earned a few extra thousand on top
Julia was getting worried about the growth of the site she was keeping an eye on and noticed that some sellers
were starting to sell hard drugs during the first few weeks of operation sellers
offered mostly marijuana and psychedelics like Ross himself was doing with these mushrooms but now sellers
were starting to offer speed cocaine and heroin Julia believed that the consequences for Ross would now be much
more severe as something happened to one of silk road's users or if he was caught
by the authorities the book American kingpin details an argument Julia had with Ross she asked what if someone
overdoses Ross answered we have a rating system so if someone sells bad drugs they get a bad rating and no one will
buy from them again Ross was referring to a new feature he just added to Silk Road when people
bought or sold they got good or bad feedback just like eBay Julia responded how are they supposed to
give someone a bad rating if they are dead Julia also raised her concern about who
was actually visiting the website neither her nor Ross expected Silk Road to grow as fast as a hat and it was only
getting bigger by the day users were discussing Silk Road non-stop the discussions had grown from Bitcoin
forums and moved to websites like 4chan and reddit at the end of May 2011 journalist Adrienne Chen stumbled across
several of these posts Chen wrote for Gawker a well-known new york-based blogging and news media site the site's
main tagline was today's gossip is tomorrow's news as detailed in the book Silk Road by Elaine Ormsby Chen was on
the Bitcoin talk forum when he stumbled across a number of posts talking about Silk Road
at this point Bitcoin advocates were worried that Silk Road was giving Bitcoin a bad name as it was being
promoted as the currency to pay for drugs on the dark web the more Adrienne Chen read the more skeptical he became
he found it hard to believe that there was a website where drugs could be sold so comfortably online it seemed too easy
Chen decided to follow the steps to enter Silk Road and as he browse through the site
he saw that there were exactly three hundred and forty three different listings of drugs with all sorts of
variations the prices varied as well there were drugs that were very expensive others that were the same as
street level prices and others that were cheaper Chen believed that there was definitely potential for his story but
he still remained skeptical he wanted to talk to someone who had actually bought
drugs from the soil he posted a message on the Bitcoin talk forum stating he was
going to write a story on Silk Road and he wanted to interview someone who had bought drugs there several people
responded to Adrienne's post detailing their experiences using Silk Road but he also got a response he wasn't expecting
he got a response from Ross Ross never revealed his true identity he made a new account on the Bitcoin talk forum under
the name Silk Road to message Chen Ross asked Chen to hold off on the story because Silk Road wanted to get bigger
but wasn't ready for the attention quite yet Chen said he couldn't hold off the story was going to be written now unable
to get the story shut down Ross decided to contribute to it he said that he was very proud of Silk Road and its
community and he believed Silk Road was definitely making the purchase of drugs safer he ended with the following quote
the stade is the primary source of violence oppression theft and all forms of coercion stop funding the state with
your tax dollars and direct your productive energies into the black market at 4:20 p.m. on June 1st 2011
Adrienne Chen's article was published on Gawker on the title of the article was the
underground website where you can buy any drug imaginable as an opener a chin rope making small talk with your pot
dealer sucks buying cocaine can get you shot what if you could buy and sell drugs online like books or light bulbs
now you can welcome to Silk Road chain included photos of the various drugs available in screenshots of the website
itself the article exploded it was read by millions according to many it was Chan's article that brought Silk Road to
the masses one of the people who read the article was New York Senator Chuck Schumer within three days of Chen's
article being released Senator Schumer gave a press conference to address Silk Road he was filmed
sitting in front of a computer visiting Silk Road himself pointing at the pictures of the drugs for sale under
naming them senator schumer quote literally it allows buyers and users to sell illegal drugs online including
heroin cocaine and meth and uses sell by hiding their identities through a program that makes them virtually
untraceable it's a certifiable one-stop shop for illegal drugs that represents the most
brazen attempt to peddle drugs online that we have ever seen it's more grazing than anything else by light-years by
cracking down on the website immediately we can help stop these drugs from flooding our streets today on calling on
the DEA and the Department of Justice to immediately shut down this site before more damage is done the other person who
gave a public statement was Senator Joe Manchin from West Virginia who also called for the website to be shut down
immediately both senators joined forces and wrote a letter directed at US Attorney General Eric Holder who managed
the Department of Justice and the DEA [Music] in response Ross gave a public statement
of his own in the Silk Road forums which had existed since the beginning of the site
Ross posted a message under the name admin which was how all silk road users knew him no one knew his actual identity
just that he was admin the message read quote as many of you know US Senators are aware of the site and aiming to take
it down the dire have been cast and now we will see how they land will be diverting even more effort into
countering their attacks and making the site as resilient as possible which means we may not be as responsive to
messages for a while I'm sure this news will scare some off but should we win the fight a new era will be born even if
we lose the genie is out of the bottle and they are fighting a losing war already it's better to live one day as a
lion than a hundred years as a lamb Roth sounded encouraging and fearless on the side but things were different in
real life the Gawker article and the subsequent public statements by two US senators brought a lot more attention to
Silk Road in a few days the number of registered users on the site jumped from 1,000 to 10,000 and the forums were
filled with endless posts many users who were already using the site were pissed
off at Adrienne Chang's article because Silk Road was supposed to be an underground secret Ross was also having
problems with Bitcoin every time there was a new purchase on the site he lost bitcoins out of his own account
and he had no idea why he was also concerned that the servers wouldn't be able to handle the increased traffic to
the web site so he decided to do what the Senators had asked he shut Silk Road down it happened on June 9th eight days
after the Gawker article was published Ross started checking all of the coding and programming he'd done until he found
what the problem was when he designed Silk Road he had connected his own Bitcoin account
to the interface of the website in order to fix this he rewrote the code and he was able to stop his bitcoins from
disappearing every time there was a new purchase because of the fact Ross was so
inexperienced and hadn't done programming or coding before he realized there was a number of other potential
problems on the site that had to be fixed as well he reopened Silk Road on June 17th but
disabled the possibility for any new registrations this gave him time to fix the other mistakes in his programming
and coding existing members of Silk Road took advantage and sold their memberships off at different forums they
went to reddit 4chan and Bitcoin talked and offered their Silk Road seller accounts to whoever bid the most On June
26th Ross reopened registrations on Silk Road but he made a change the seller accounts
when they are put up for auction previously a user could simply purchase a seller account for $500 but now the
seller accounts were optioned off one every 48 hours to the highest bidder Ross released a post on the site to
explain this change saying that he hoped it would mean only the most professional
and dedicated sellers would have access to seller accounts the options generated
a lot of action and Silk Road continued to grow with the release of the Gawker article and all of the attention abroad
things started to turn for the worse between Ross and his girlfriend Julia when his Bitcoin account started
training due to the coding problem Ross didn't leave his computer in fact he had
barely left his computer at all since Silk Road launched he dedicated a lot of time to his website and a very little
time to anything else then things got worse for Julia Ross showed her a new product on Silk
Road a seller had introduced the guns giulia completely disagreed with guns being available to buy on Silk Road she
couldn't think of any good reasons why someone would want to buy a gun anonymously Ross believed in a person's
right to defend themselves and believed that if the government could have guns then so too should the people
communication between the couple lessened until Julia decided to leave her a few days to visit her friend Erica
in New York Julia couldn't stop thinking about Ross and Silk Road a plagued her thoughts to such an extent that she
ended up telling her friend Erica about the site Erica swore she'd never tell anyone
about it Julia returned to Austin in the beginning of September 2011 she gave Ross an ultimatum her or Silk Road he
chose Silk Road he moved into a new apartment in Austin but still remained on relatively good terms with Julia they
still saw each other occasionally after the breakup Julia invited her friend Erica to move
to Austin and live with her Erica made the move but the living arrangements didn't last long
Erica and Julia wanted to score some acid for a night out so they went to a place where they knew they could get it
easily Silk Road Erica had a really bad trip which landed her in hospital Julia didn't go with her and when Erica got
out her and Julia had a huge fight Ross happened to be at Julia's apartment visiting at the time and he got in
between them he ended up grabbing Erica and pushing her out of the apartment Erica returned to New York in the next
morning Ross checked his facebook account there was a post on his wall for America that read I'm sure the
authorities would like to know about Ross Albert's drug website Ross panicked and deleted the message as
fast as he could he called Erica and told her that he was very sorry for what had happened he was in tears and pleaded
with her not to tell anyone else Erica agreed and then hung up on him Ross was angry he told Julia that she
had betrayed his trust and too now he had to leave Austin because of her Ross sold his pickup truck into then got as
far away from Austin as he could he went to Bondi in Sydney Australia we hope you're enjoying today's episode
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case file at checkout terms and conditions apply as silk road's creator Ross Ulbricht was
leaving Austin headed for Sydney Australia a new person started lurking on Silk Road it all started in June 2011
around the same time that the Gorka article came out a Customs and Border Protection Officer that worked at O'Hare
International Airport in Chicago was going through the mail when he came across an envelope that had a pill of
ecstasy inside most officers would have ceased the pill filed a report and not much more would have come of it
investigations were costly and time and resources wouldn't be committed to a single ecstasy pill there would need to
be a lot more pills for the case to be taken seriously but this particular customs officer decided to call the
Homeland Security investigation team in Chicago the homeland security officer that answered the call was Jarod
der-yeghiayan what most homeland security officers would do have called about a single pill of ecstasy found in
the mail would be to say tell someone who cares but Jared was very new at his job he'd only been at it for a few
months so we listened to what the customs officer had to say it turned out that the ecstasy pill was
just passing through Chicago it was actually headed for Minneapolis 400 miles away so if Jarrod investigated
that single pill he'd have to travel all the way to Minneapolis to speak to the person the mail was addressed to Jarrod
thanked the customs officer for the call that explained he couldn't travel to Minneapolis for one pill however he did
tell him to call him again if a pill or any other drug came through the mail that was actually headed for Chicago
this happened two four months later on October 5th 2011 the Customs and Border Protection Officer came across a small
envelope that had the name and address printed from a computer Ross had always believed that printing names and
addresses from a computer looked more businesslike and less suspicious than handwriting them but on this occasion it
was actually the reason the Border Protection Officer thought the envelope looked suspicious there was only a small
envelope and normally envelopes of that size had the name and address handwritten so that's what got the
offices attention initially then he saw the envelope came from the Netherlands a
country known for drugs lastly when he felt the envelope he felt a small buck he filed a report that authorized him to
open the envelope and inside he found a pink ecstasy pill just like he had for months earlier but this time the pills
destination was Chicago so the customs officer caught Jarrett from Homeland Security again jared drove to our
Airport and seized the pill in order to attend the address the pill was headed to he'd have to go with his supervisor
since jared was so new in his job he was assigned the supervisor to watch over him for the first year the supervisor
authorized the visit and a week later they drove to the address where the pill was headed on the north side of Chicago
they knocked on the door and a young man answered jared asked for david since that's who the envelope was addressed to
the young man said David was his roommate and he was at work Jared pulled out the envelope with the
pillow and showed David's roommate the roommate told Jared that he knew about the pills he said they came from a
website Silk Road Jared had never heard of Silk Road and he asked the roommate would watts the roommate gave a basic
explanation of the site and how it worked he said they had purchased marijuana meth and ecstasy from it in
the past Jared left the house confused he didn't understand how such a website could
exist he returned to the office and search for open cases on Silk Road but he found none he then tied Silk Road
into Google to see what he could find he founds the Gawker article and read all about it he also found instructions on
how to enter Silk Road the site fascinated and petrified Jared at the same time he couldn't stop thinking
about it and a few days later he made a decision he was going to build a case against
Silk Road he went to his supervisor and presented him with an idea he knew that a single
pill would never be taken seriously but what if he collected a large amount of drugs then it would have to be taken
seriously Jared's supervisor allowed him to take on Silk Road as a side project so jared
started collecting drugs he went to see the Customs and Border Protection Officer at O'Hare Airport and asked him
to keep every single envelope that had drugs inside every night Jared drove to the airport and collected whatever drugs
had been found in about two months he had 100 envelopes at the end of November 2011
Jared felt he had enough to make a case and together with his supervisor they met with an assistant US attorney in
Chicago the following is detailed in the book American kingpin by Nick Bilton Jared entered the office opened a
backpack and through 30 envelopes onto the floor the assistant US attorney just looked at him confused
Jared picked up H envelope and placed them on the desk this one had OSD this one had
amphetamines this one ketamine this one heroin the assistant US attorney was astonished that all of those drugs had
been bought online and then delivered through the mail but still he thought there might be bigger fish to fry
jared was ready for that response and had prepared a speech Jared said this isn't about the drugs this isn't about
that one little pill this is about the site overall and what it stands for it's about how the people on this side are
using our Internet built by the United States government to run an anonymous web browser also built by the United
States government and are they're using the United States postal system to circumvent the laws of our country and
there's nothing we can do to stop them this is just the beginning it's drugs now but could be used for terrorism next
imagine a worst-case scenario where a group like Al Qaeda uses the soil or the exact same setup to coordinate attacks
against America all with tools built by the United States the words sunk in with
the assistant US attorney and after a moment of consideration he told Jared that yes he could do it he could open a
case on Silk Road Jared made his plan and that December he got into Silk Road and registered an
account he started what he called profiling his ultimate goal was to find out who ran Silk Road but in order to
reach that person he had to first start with the community to begin with he decided he would pose as a buyer and
purchase drugs but doing this he expected two things one was that he would be able to start profiling sellers
by identifying their listings on the site their communication through messages in their packaging techniques
and second he would be able to gauge how much drug trafficking actually occurred
on Silk Road after completing a lot of paperwork to get authorization to buy drugs Jared was
given $1,000 he went online to a Bitcoin exchange and traded the dollars for bitcoins
he bought a total of 18 different drugs from 18 different sellers in six different countries including ecstasy
opium tea in synthetic marijuana Jared had the drugs delivered to a secret post-office box at O'Hare Airport
he knew the drugs were sent through the mail but he didn't know how many packages actually made it to their
destination after he made his purchases Jared got his answer out of the 18 packages that he bought only one was
intercepted by Customs and Border Protection another package never arrived and two the other 16 were safely waiting
for him in his post-office box before he left Austin and headed to Bondi Ross Ulbricht had to take care of a loose end
Richard Richard was his friend from the University of Texas who he had called to
help with the programming and coding of Silk Road in the very beginning ross had
refused to tell him what the programming accoding was for Richard agreed to help
and didn't ask any questions but when Ross asked him for more help Richard refused he said he wasn't going
to help him anymore unless he knew what the project was Ross couldn't handle the
coding and programming on his own so he had no choice he told Richard about Silk
Road Richard found it interesting and agreed to continue helping Ross gave him drugs as payment for his services and
Richard also bought drugs on his own from Silk Road but after a while Richard started to fear the consequences of
being caught and he stopped hoping Ross knew Richard was a loose end and he paid
him a visit before leaving for Australia he told Richard about Erica's move to Austin the fight that happened with
Julia and the post Erica had written on his Facebook wall Richards fear increased tenfold after hearing that and
he asked for us to shut silkroad down he told him it wasn't worth going to prison
for but Ross told Richard he couldn't shut it down because he'd given Silk Road to someone else he didn't run it
anymore he was lying Silk Road was still his but this was his idea of tying up the loose end pretending he no longer
ran the website since everyone's identity on Silk Road was anonymous he told Richard he didn't even know who the
new owner was Richard believed him and Ross then made the move to Australia Ross lived in Bondi with his sister he
continued to manage Silk Road under the cover of doing online freelance work and
day trading so people weren't suspicious as to why he was always on his computer
it was wild living in Australia that he was contacted by a new user on Silk Road
Ross had people who helped him with the Silk Road forums as moderators and he had new program as he had found on the
site working for him as well but he still had a lot of problems and security breaches and it took one person
to point them all out Ross was contacted by someone who called themselves variety Jones
he told Ross that he stumbled upon Silk Road after reading the Gawker article he
found it hard to believe that such a website could exist without being seized by authorities so he made his way into
the Silk Road service like a hacker would and he checked the files of the site to make sure it wasn't actually
being run by law enforcement variety Jones's suspicion was that if the site hadn't been seized then perhaps it was a
trick by the police or the DEA but when hacking the site he discovered it was actually genuine so that led him to
contact Ross or Silk Roads administrator as variety Jones knew you when he first
introduced himself variety Jones said there isn't anyone who knows me even a little bit that would ever dream of
crossing me if they did dream of it that would wake up and call to apologize this
got Ross's attention the first matter variety Jones wanted to address was the security of Silk Road Ross already knew
security was his biggest weakness and he was more than eager to listen to what variety Jones had to say but before he
got into security variety Jones wanted to make sure Ross knew what he was dealing with he said not to be a downer
or anything but understand what we are doing falls under us drug kingpin laws which provides a maximum penalty of
death upon conviction the mandatory minimum is life Ross had done his own research and already knew what was at
stake so his answer to variety Jones was balls to the wall and all in my friend and with that the two men formed a
friendship even though they had no idea who the other person really was variety Jones gave Ross all sorts of advice and
acted almost like a mentor he's seem to have far more experience and knowledge in almost everything than
Ross their conversations were recorded in chat logs and are highlighted in the book American kingpin cross asked
variety Jones what are my strengths Jones answered you play your cards close you really do get that it's gone from
fun and games to a very serious life-or-death lifestyle you've created Ross then asked what are my weaknesses
Jones answered your inability to discourage we know garter snake and a copperhead and to the gaping holes in
your knowledge of security Ross didn't understand the reference about the snake so Jones explained recognizing something
is dangerous when you think it's harmless at first Ross and variety Jones talked every few days then every few
hours then every few minutes variety Jones was soon making joint decisions with Ross regarding Silk Road and he
slowly started to ask about his personal life in one instance he asked Ross in real life is there anyone with a clue at
all that you whoever you are started the Silk Road girlfriend-boyfriend bunny you talked to
online buddies who you've known for years grandma priest rabbi stripper Ross's reply was
unfortunately yes there are two one person I'll probably never speak to again and the other I'll drift away from
never making the mistake of telling someone again some days after that conversation variety Jones came up with
an answer to Ross's problem he always seemed to know what to say and when to say it he asked for us
have you seen The Princess Bride The Princess Bride is a fantasy family orientated film from 1987 based on a
book by William Goldman Ross said that he had seen it variety Jane said so you know the history of the Dread Pirate
Roberts the Dread Pirate Roberts was a character in The Princess Bride it wasn't one man
but a series of individuals who passed the name and reputation on to a chosen successor once they are wealthy enough
to retire and because of that no one ever knew who the original Dread Pirate Roberts was Variety Jones told Ross you
need to change your name from admin to Dread Pirate Roberts he said by doing so Ross could maintain his story that he
had given the site to someone else and all he knew was that the person he gave it to went by the name Dread Pirate
Roberts Ross loved the idea and on February 5th 2012 Silk Road admin and the answer they were going by a new name
Dread Pirate Roberts the name became a quick success the Silk Road community understood the reference
to the Princess Bride and believed that it was indeed a perfect name on so many levels
most of rasa's employees none of whom knew his real identity started calling him captain one of his program has told
him we really can change the world we are really lucky this opportunity is on a scale of a few times in a millennia
all of his employees said that they had the same aim as Ross to legalize drugs and to ensure that future generations
wouldn't spend their lives behind bars for selling or using drugs one year after opening Silk Road was
continuing to grow at a rapid rate in December 2011 drug sales totaled $500,000 per month
three months later in March 2012 drug sales had increased the $500,000 per week Ross was making a lot of money with
his six point two three percent commission but not everything was perfect there were problems in the
community itself between buyers and sellers involving loss packages and disputes with the transactions and it
wasn't a secret the Silk Road security was lacking on one occasion a hacker stole 75 thousand dollars worth of
bitcoins from the site Ross struggled to keep calm he had a few panic attacks and
he constantly be these nails he went on a holiday to Asia but he told variety Jones that he was unable to enjoy the
trip at all he had to constantly check on Silk Road no matter where he was and Wi-Fi wasn't the best where he visited
not only that most of the places that had Wi-Fi were extremely busy and Ross had a rule if someone could peer over
his shoulder he would move location so no one could see what he was doing something else that had added to his
nerves was that some Asian countries had the death penalty for drug offences so it wasn't a very relaxing holiday
Ross returned to Australia after a month in Asia after which he had a discussion
with variety Jones about the money that were making variety Jones was estimating
how much they would be making by the end of the year but Ross interrupted him and
said that money won't be worth much if we're behind bars Variety Jones said that they needed to come up with a plan
one of the first things they decided had to happen was for Ross to lead a healthier lifestyle he basically lived
on his computer so variety Jones recommended that he take long walks eat healthier meals and have longer
meditation times Ross also decided to leave Australia and head back home on April 10th 2012 he
returned to Austin Texas while Ross was returning to Texas the investigation into Silk Road by Chicago based homeland
security officer Jarod der-yeghiayan was going slower than he would have liked he
was working on profiling the sellers but it wasn't easy every time an envelope with drugs was
found by Customs and Border Protection Jarrod would drive to O'Hare Airport to get it no matter what song a day or
night it was then he would photograph everything fill out a seizure form and stack it up in his office by now he had
over 500 different envelopes and he had pictures of the seized drug stuck all over his walls once he seized the drug
he went on Silk Road and searched the drugs on display from H seller to save he could match them to the drugs
intercepted by customs and border control all of this took a long time and on top of that both sellers and buyers
at Silk Road were getting smarter when it came to buyers many would use PGP encryption which turns any text the
person enters into an undecipherable block that can only be opened and seen by the person that's addressed to you by
using a private key when it came to sellers they used every imaginable trick to send a drug so they wouldn't be found
one seller put pills inside a hollow marker pen another put cocaine inside hollowed-out batteries another put their
drugs in the glue behind a shampoo sample inside a magazine heroin was often sent folded inside some sheets of
a4 paper in an envelope disguised as coming from either a real-estate agent a bank or a travel agent it couldn't be
detected when touched as outlined in the book Silk Road olá norms B most packages
got through customs but some were intercepted this was known to Silk Road sellers and one of them slipped a note
inside his envelopes which read if you are the intended recipient please use responsibly if you are law enforcement
go [ __ ] yourself sellers on Silk Road had their own secret section in the forum's called the vendors round table
in order to become a part of the vendors round table their seller needed to have
proven qualifications which meant they required a good sales record over a certain period of time in the VIN doors
roundtable forum sellers gave tips to one another on how to hide their drugs and which method worked best for what
they would also discuss ways to make sales more swiftly and other things to make life easier for them all they
understood that they were competing with each other but at the same time they were also part of a community and when
one of them won everyone won so they didn't mind helping each other out another issue that discussed in the
vendors round table was the presence of suspicious buyers buyers who threatened sellers requesting more drugs or they
give back feedback and buyers who gave off what they called bad law-enforcement vibes despite the fact that sellers
helped each other out on the forum they also took precautions if a seller wanted
to make a purchase of their own from Silk Road they always create at a separate buyer account although
most Silk Road sellers respected one another giving your address away to a fellow dealer was never a good idea all
in all the Silk Road community was becoming more professional as a group they continued to generate more press as
well since that first article appeared in Gawker one year earlier Silk Road was now being covered repeatedly by networks
such as NPR ABC and several others early norms Beat describes in her book Silk Road that a lot of journalists who
visited the site were surprised at the discussions taking place on the forums it wasn't filled with the dropkicks and
trolls they were expecting there were well-thought-out intellectual posts discussions debates and even forum
threads dedicated to charity there were discussions about harm minimization that
a doctor participated in they were posts from terminal cancer patients thanking the Dread Pirate Roberts for creating a
place where they could get access to cannabis to help live out their days more peacefully posts from people who
said their use of drugs was much safer now thanks to Silk Road it was becoming a thriving community it was by no means
a place filled with just crackheads and criminals homeland security officer Jarod der-yeghiayan saw all of this and
he was worried about the slow progress of his investigation while Silk Road was only getting bigger brighter and better
by the day he also worried that if more people were finding out about the site then more law enforcement agencies would
want to build a case to shut it down and he wasn't wrong there were already other
agencies trying to build cases on Silk Road as detailed in the book American kingpin
jared found out about it one afternoon in June 2012 he was sitting in his office going through some envelopes when
he heard a beeping sound coming from his computer it was a notification that someone was reading his case when he
checked who he saw that it was two agents from the Homeland Security office in Baltimore very soon after that
Jarrett's supervisor received an email saying that the Baltimore agents were traveling to Chicago to discuss the Silk
Road case and to they were bringing their US attorney with them Jared and his supervisor agreed to the meeting
the meeting didn't involve much of a discussion the agents from Baltimore explained that they had turned a dealer
who had given them a list of names that belonged to sellers on Silk Road they planned to go after those sellers and
they were certain that one of the names they had belonged to the owner of Silk Road Jared told the Baltimore agents
they were making it sound way too easy they had no idea what they were dealing with and they had no respect for tor or
for Bitcoin Jared was shut down by the US Attorney from Baltimore who told him that Baltimore would be leading the
investigation but he was welcome to help if he had something important to add Jared supervisor responded here's what
we're gonna do you guys are gonna go your way we're gonna go our way and we'll deconflict when we have to
deconflict meant having a deconfliction meeting which was a meeting with several
representatives from the government who listened to all agencies involved in a case and then decided who got to lead it
the Baltimore team agreed and both parties went their separate ways not before the Baltimore team said they were
pretty sure they would have Silk Road shut down in a matter of weeks but it turned out that the list of Silk Road
sellers the Baltimore agents heard was nothing more than a dead end they did have something going for them though
well not something someone the Baltimore in had originally started in January 2012
the Baltimore Homeland Security Investigations team had their informant who gave them the list of sellers but
they weren't use the tackling drug related cases so they asked for help from the DEA and the DEA offered them
one of their agents Carl force most of Karl's work was done in an office he'd done field work and worked
undercover previously but he developed a few bad habits along the way including a
drug habit so he took some time off and when he returned to work he was put behind a desk in January 2012 Karl
supervisor informed him that the Baltimore Homeland Security team were going to build a case against Silk Road
and he was asked to assist them Karl had heard about Silk Road before and had done some google searches on it which
led him to the Gawker article written by Adrian Chen Karl believed it was a huge
case but he had no specialized computer knowledge so it wasn't something he could handle but when the opportunity
came up for him to assist Baltimore's homeland security team with the case he jumped at it one of the first things the
Baltimore homeland security agents showed karl was how to download tor and data access Silk Road once karl was
inside Silk Road his interest grew further and further every day after work he closed himself up in a spare room at
home and he searched the site and read the forums to learn everything he could the baltimore homeland security team
believed their best bet was to arrest dealers who were selling on Silk Road and eventually that would lead them to
the site's creator the Dread Pirate Roberts the karl force came up with his own plan first carla force created a
fake identity and a backstory the story he came up with was that he was originally from the Dominican Republic
and he knew people all over South America who could take care of trafficking drugs laundering money and
any other dirty work he owned twenty five million dollars per year smuggling coke and heroin into the United States
and with that backstory in mind on April 21st 2012 DEA agent Karl force registered on Silk
Road with the username Norma the first thing Kyle did when he registered was scented the Dread Pirate
Roberts a message he said he was a great admirer of his work and he then introduced himself using the backstory
he had created he said he believed Silk Road could be the future of drug trafficking and he wanted to make a
proposal he wanted to buy the site Carla force didn't have authorization to do this he'd gone rogue when the
Baltimore homeland security agents found out they didn't approve but there wasn't
much they could do about it the message was already sent they just had to hope the Dread Pirate Roberts
didn't suspect anything meanwhile Ross Ulbricht aka the Dread Pirate Roberts was busy with a
number of things unfolding on Silk Road he put a new message on the site called the state of the road address and of
course the problem the state of the road address from the Dread Pirate Roberts mentioned the media attention Silk Road
was getting he said Silk Road was never meant to be private and exclusive it was
meant to grow and be a force to be reckoned with so the attention was welcomed and the more people on the soil
the more prosperity that would be he called Silk Road a revolution and said how proud he was of it
he then mentioned the escrow system and the fact that some new members were being lured into trading outside of
escrow and finalizing early this was being done to avoid paying the Commission to Ross for sales on the side
a number of schemes had been pulled off this way so Ross had an idea to combat it he announced that the flat six point
two three percent Commission on all sales was gone it was to hire for transactions over $300 and two that's
what made trading outside of the escrow system so attractive a seller who sold one ecstasy pill was being charged the
same percentage as someone who sold a kilo of cocaine so instead of the flat Commission Ross announced that Silk Road
would now be scaling their Commission's orders less than fifty dollars had the highest Commission at 10 percent and
orders over $1,000 had the lowest at 1.5 percent and that there were a number of
other levels in between Ross had come up with this new phase system in consultation with variety Jones they
thought it made it fairer for everyone but they didn't anticipate the extreme rage that came from many sellers soon
after the state of the road address came out a debate started on the forums some
were okay with the change that most people weren't most sellers on Silk Road didn't identify exclusively as small or
big dealers they simply adapted to the demand if a buyer asked for a few pills they could get them if a buyer wanted a
shitload of pills many sellers could make arrangements to make that happen but for the most part Silk Road
attracted recreational users so most of the transactions were at the lower level
meaning they now attracted higher fees that's what the new fee structure caused such an outrage
the Silk Road forums exploded with complaints they also weren't happy with the fact that the Dread Pirate Roberts
seemed to be so proud of how Silk Road was working but then in the same message he was declaring that the Commission's
were rising and more money would be taken out of sellers pockets it seemed like a contradicting message the outrage
on the forum continued until the Dread Pirate Roberts responded with this to those of you that are either supportive
of the change or have faith in what I'm doing regardless of whether you see the point or not thank you for your support
I've done everything I can to earn that trust and I cherish it to those of you talking my actions up to pure greed and
ignoring the context for the changes I say shame on you when have I lied when have I cheated or stolen from anyone
here when have I treated anyone unfairly when have I led you astray why do you turn on me now when I have poured my
heart and soul into this community and project 10% on $50 orders we're talking about an extra dollar and 88 cents a ten
dollar order an extra 38 cents do you think this site build itself do you think it runs itself do you have any
clue what goes on behind the scenes to keep this going do you have any idea the risk the people operating this side of
taking do you have any clue what we've been through to get here today do you have any clue what it's going to take to
get through the next year whether you like it or not on the captain of the ship if you don't like
the rules of the game where you don't trust your captain you can get off the boat
it took some time but most people accepted this message and went on with their sales
it wasn't like business was struggling some sellers were pulling in twenty thousand dollars per month some claim to
be making over four thousand dollars per day despite no sellers copying the new phase on the chin and getting on with it
Ross could sense the matter wasn't over he shared his thoughts with Variety Jones in April 2012 telling him I
suspect that several of talking about making backup plans the JumpShip or create competing sites but don't want to
mutiny at this point variety Jones was handling most of Silk Roads programmers and was essentially second-in-command he
told Ross he'd mingle with both buyers and sellers to see what the general feeling was and to see if there was any
talk of a mutiny at the same time Ross thought it would be a good idea to run a promotion he called it the great 4/20
sale and giveaway on April 20th 2012 the world's official marijuana day the biggest ever Silk Road sale occurred the
sale started 4:20 p.m. on Friday April 20th and ended at 5:20 p.m. on Sunday April 22nd for those 49 hours a buyer
could win a prize every four hundred and twenty seconds four hundred and twenty prizes in total the big prize was a trip
for two for 12 days with $2,000 included for expenses every time a person made a
purchase that would earn a ticket to be added to the draw for the big prize so essentially the more drugs you bought
the more chances you had of winning a holiday in addition Ross added a 10% discount on every product this was made
possible as Ross didn't charge commission for the duration of the sale and he encouraged sellers to pass that
saving on to the buyers one seller in particular was very excited about the sale he went by the
name Tony 76 Tony 76 had the greatest reputation out of all the sellers on Silk Road his reviews and ratings were
constantly 100 percent positive no one ever complained he was also very helpful and polite to everyone on the
site when the great 420 sale and giveaway came Tony 76 announced several benefits first
he offered discounts far larger than 10% second he was opening up his products to
international buyers previously he'd only sold to us buyers and third he started the sale early 24 hours before
the official launch he only had one condition which he outlined in the following message I can't afford to have
so much money tied up in escrow and have it affect my ability to reload on product if you're uncomfortable
finalizing early I completely understand but it's not optional for this order and I advise you
to not order Tonie 76 was doing what the Dread Pirate Roberts explicitly told people not to do
Tony wanted people to deal outside the escrow system and pay him before they got their drugs in other circumstances
buyers would have found this proposal suspicious but it wasn't the first time that Tony 76 had requested this and
everything had gone smoothly on those previous occasions he had an impeccable reputation and people were happy to
finalize early with him Tony 76 thrived during the sale he was the number one seller by far
in fact he sold so many drugs that on April 25th he released a message for all buyers that he would be taking his
listings down in 12 hours time so he could catch up on the sale orders so if you wanted something he had to get in
quick buyers scrambled to get their orders in on time from one of the most trusted sellers on Silk Road
it's estimated that Tony's 76 made a quarter of a million dollars in that one weekend of the sale but no one ever got
their drugs Tony 76 had used silk rows biggest sale to play the biggest scam anyone on the
site had ever pulled off when buyers complained the response from the Dread Pirate Roberts was short and concise
he explained that Silk Roads escrow system avoided scams like this and it was the buyers decision to disrespect
that system therefore no one was getting refunded meanwhile variety Jones got back to Ross
with some info he had done some digging and spoken to several people and it seems Ross's fears were real there was
talk of mutiny sellers weren't sure what they were going to do yet but they had three options in mind one was the leave
Silk Road and moved to black market reloaded a new site that had emerged that followed the same idea of Silk Road
but without any libertarian ideals behind it also that was truly underground and hadn't made the
mainstream press yet and the owner seemed more than happy to keep it under the radar
the second option being considered was for sellers to build their own site to compete with Silk Road and the third
option was to hack into Silk Road and take over full command of it the option that scared Ross the most was the third
one he knew the security was still Silk Roads main issue and it was right at this time that Ross received the message
from a new user called nob offering to buy the site nob was the account DEA agent cart force and created Ross
answered knobs message saying I'm open to the idea what did you have in mind nob told him that in order to make an
official offer he would need to see Silk Roads financials which included sales upgrade costs salaries for
administrators and monitors and any other costs with this information Carr thought it would assist the
investigation but giving war enforcement a clearer picture of just how big Silk Road was but Ross didn't share those
numbers he was the only person with access to them not even variety Jones knew the exact numbers and he was his
main advisor Ross's answer instead was I think an offer for the entire operation
would need to be nine figures for me to consider it the figure Ross was asking for wasn't
far from $1,000,000,000 Karl force nearly fell off his chair how many drugs were being distributed on this side if
that was the asking price he composed himself and typed a response I could pay nine figures but I'm not sure Silk Road
is worth that as of now instead he offered what he called a spinoff the idea was to create a market for the
major dealers that would be called masters of the Silk Road in this market the major dealers would get to selling
hundreds of kilos knob reminded the Dread Pirate Roberts that he knew a lot of smuggling routes all over the world
so he could help make it happen he offered two million dollars to have 20% ownership of the Masters of the Silk
Road the idea intrigued for us and he wanted to learn more from then on knob and the Dread Pirate Roberts started to
communicate regularly Ross had no idea he was really speaking to a DEA agent and Carl force had no idea about the
true identity of the Dread Pirate Roberts but it was a promising start to be continued
[Music] [Music] you

Case 76: Silk Road (Part 1)

[Part 1 of 3]

The Silk Road was an ancient network of trade routes that started in China in the 2nd century B.C. Via a combination of roads, and sea routes, goods like silk, paper and spices were transported from the producers in Asia to markets in Europe. Eventually, it wasn’t just goods that were traded – there were also ideas, customs, religions and even diseases…

CREDITS

Narration – Anonymous Host Research and writing – Victoria Dieffenbacher Production, scoring – Mike Migas Additional scoring – Andrew Joslyn

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RESOURCES

For all credits and sources please visit https://www.casefilepodcast.com/case-76-silk-road-part-1

Brief Summary

Silk Road's rise and Ross Ulbricht's challenges in creating an anonymous drug marketplace are explored in this episode.

Key points

The Silk Road: A Historical Overview. The Silk Road was an ancient network of trade routes that connected Asia, Europe, and Africa, facilitating not just trade but the exchange of ideas and cultures.
Ross's Journey into Libertarianism. Ross's interest in libertarianism led him to adopt a minimalist lifestyle, living with only the necessities.
Bitcoin: The Perfect Solution. Bitcoin emerged as a decentralized cryptocurrency, aligning perfectly with Ross's vision for an untraceable marketplace.
The Birth of Silk Road. Ross launched Silk Road, an anonymous marketplace, aiming to create a free-trade environment on the Deep Web.
Silk Road's Launch. Ross creates Silk Road, a platform for anonymous transactions using Bitcoin.
Gawker Article Goes Viral. Adrienne Chen's article brings Silk Road to the masses, attracting significant attention.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

The Silk Road is recognized as the very first true globalization that the world experienced.

2:54WatchNov 20, 2018

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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