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A Dutch national known equally 'Mr Dark' — who allegedy made $1.6 meg in cryptocurrency from hosting tearing rape and child pornography videos — has been indicted by a Federal Grand Jury in the District of Columbia.

Michael Rahim Mohammed, 32, allegedly operated the 'Dark Scandals' website, which has operated on both the darknet and the normal spider web since 2022.

The site hosted more than 2000 videos and images, and advertised that it offered "real blackmail, rape and forced videos of girls all effectually the globe."

Users could pay for the illegal content — delivered in electronic mail 'packs' for download — with Bitcoin or Ethereum, or by uploading their own videos to the content library. In total the site received 1650 deposits of cryptocurrency, including 188 Bitcoin and 26.vii Ether.

Site rules prohibited simulated sexual violence

The site'south rules prohbited "faux, apprentice…or acted movies", insisted on "real rape/forced content", and stated a preference for "ain made material."

Simply while cryptocurrency helped fund the site, it also recorded the details of the crime on the blockchain.

Police enforcement agencies were able to rails 303 Bitcoin and Ethereum accounts that paid cryptocurrency to the site using Chainalysis transaction tracing software. A forfeiture complaint seeks to recover the funds and give the proceeds to the victims.

The complaint notes many accounts were opened purely for the 1 transaction and had incomplete KYC verification. Simply the analysis helped identify other illicit transactions also:

"Law enforcement observed numerous payments from these accounts to other darknet markets, which were flagged by blockchain analytics companies, enabling law enforcement to identify illicit transactions."

Darknet no longer so dark

The site was brought down after an international investigation was launched including US investigators, the Dutch National Law, Europol, and the German Federal Criminal Police.

Michael Rahim Mohammed has been charged with distribution of child pornography, production and transportation of obscene matters for sale or distribution, engaging in the business organization of selling or transferring obscene matter, and laundering of monetary instruments.

Chief Don Fort of IRS Criminal Investigation said the instance should serve equally a alert to other criminals that officials can smoothen a lite on the darknet:

"Criminals should know if you leave a digital footprint, we volition detect y'all. If you exploit our children, we will put you behind bars. If y'all idea you were anonymous, think again. The dark web is not quite as nighttime today due to the hard work of IRS-CI and our partner agencies."