The dark web is considered the darker place of the World Wide Web. Not accessible using normal web browsers and not indexed by search engines in general, the place hides many people and their malicious deeds and intentions.
As those people leverage Tor's anonymity, they are also covering their tracks when it comes to online transaction. And Bitcoin here, is still the most popular cryptocurrency on the dark web market places.
According to a report by the Europol, in its assessment of internet-organized crimes:
Europol noted that Bitcoin‘s prevalence in the underground economy is a result of its familiarity within the customer base.
People are already using Bitcoins for online transactions on the surface web. And on the deep web, vendors are long utilizing Bitcoins as the currency of payment. So a shift in this trend would be difficult. As long as the parties involved are comfortable in using Bitcoin, the trend for people in using this particular cryptocurrency is difficult to fade.
"However, there has been a more pronounced shift towards more privacy-orientated currencies, a trend that it is anticipated will continue as criminal users become more security aware."
"This is not for lack of action on the side of the public and the private sector. Rather, this persistence demonstrates the complexity of countering cybercrime and the perspective that criminals only innovate when existing modi operandi have become unsuccessful. Therefore, while much focus in contemporary parlance is on the potential impact of future technological developments on cybercrime, such as Artificial Intelligence, we must approach cybercrime in a holistic sense."
"Countering cybercrime is as much about its present forms as it is about future projections*. New threats do not only arise from new technologies but, as is often demonstrated, come from known vulnerabilities in existing technologies."
