Odaily Planet Daily News The United States has imposed sanctions on Behrouz Parsarad, the Iranian operator of the dark web market Nemesis, and his crypto addresses. Since its establishment in 2021, the market has been used to sell illegal items such as drugs, fake documents and hacker resources.
The sanctioned assets include 44 Bitcoin addresses and 5 Monero addresses, which received more than $850,000, and the total amount has exceeded $1.6 million as the price of cryptocurrencies has risen. After the sanctions, US citizens are not allowed to trade with Parsarad and his holding company.
Before the joint law enforcement action by the United States, Germany and Lithuania to seize the server, Nemesis had 30,000 active users and thousands of sellers, and the platform had built-in money laundering functions. It is estimated that Parsarad has made millions of dollars in profits and is still trying to rebuild operations.
Despite the increase in law enforcement actions, dark web markets still generated more than $1.7 billion in revenue in 2024. Russian-speaking dark web markets dominate the market due to low law enforcement risks, and several dark web markets have been closed in early 2024.