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Start date:
Mar 2017
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End date:
Mar 2019
- Contact:
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Funder:
Google; Alan Turing Institute
This project investigates the economic geographies of illegal economic activities in anonymous internet marketplaces.
Overview
Between 2011 and 2013, the Silk Road marketplace was able to attract transactions worth hundreds of millions of dollars worth of (bitcoin-based) transactions. However, relatively little is known about the geography of this global trade. Although the strong anonymity on darknet markets prohibits any data collection about the geography of consumption, there is a large amount of data available about the sale of such goods and services.
This project thus seeks to employ techniques from computational social science and digital geography in order to achieve two primary objectives. First, we seek to scrape all relevant geographic information on darknet markets, building a re-usable data set at the country level (e.g. ‘the number of heroin sellers based in every country’, ‘the total number of vendors selling weapons in every country’ etc.). Second, we seek to map, visualize, and analyse those data: using multiple variables (the various categories of products and services) to ask ‘what is the geography of illicit products and services?’
We think this is an interesting question to ask for two reasons. First, because it connects to a wide range of societal concerns, including drug policy and public health. Observing these markets allows us to establish an evidence base to better understand a range of societal concerns, for example by tracing the global distribution of certain emergent practices. Second, it falls within our larger research interest of internet geography, where we try to understand the ways in which the internet is a localised medium, and not just a global one as is commonly assumed.
You can learn more about our upcoming work in this introductory blog post: “Exploring the Darknet in Five Easy Questions“.
Follow the project on Twitter.
Latest blog posts
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Darknet markets: global platforms used for local retail trade
Date Published: 16 April 2018 - 6:44 pm
Authors: Martin Dittus
Martin Dittus, Joss Wright, and Mark Graham have published a new paper and dataset on the economic geography of darknet marketplaces. Does recent growth ...
Read More Darknet markets: global platforms used for local retail trade -
A distributed resilience among darknet markets?
Date Published: 9 November 2017 - 1:25 pm
Authors: Martin Dittus
You may have seen the news earlier this year that two large darknet marketplaces, Alphabay and Hansa, have been taken down by international law ...
Read More A distributed resilience among darknet markets? -
Introducing Martin Dittus, Data Scientist and Darknet Researcher
Date Published: 13 September 2017 - 9:03 am
Authors: Martin Dittus
We’re sitting upstairs, hunched over a computer, and Martin is showing me the darknet. I guess I have as good an idea as most ...
Read More Introducing Martin Dittus, Data Scientist and Darknet Researcher
People
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Professor Mark Graham
Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford
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Dr Joss Wright
Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford
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Martin Dittus
Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford
Blog
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Darknet markets: global platforms used for local retail trade
Date Published: 16 April 2018 - 6:44 pm
Authors: Martin Dittus
Martin Dittus, Joss Wright, and Mark Graham have published a new paper and dataset on the economic geography of darknet marketplaces. Does recent growth ...
Read More Darknet markets: global platforms used for local retail trade -
A distributed resilience among darknet markets?
Date Published: 9 November 2017 - 1:25 pm
Authors: Martin Dittus
You may have seen the news earlier this year that two large darknet marketplaces, Alphabay and Hansa, have been taken down by international law ...
Read More A distributed resilience among darknet markets? -
Mapping Fentanyl Trades on the Darknet
Date Published: 16 October 2017 - 9:16 am
Authors: Mark Graham
My colleagues Joss Wright, Martin Dittus and I have been scraping the world’s largest darknet marketplaces over the last few months, as part of our darknet ...
Read More Mapping Fentanyl Trades on the Darknet -
Introducing Martin Dittus, Data Scientist and Darknet Researcher
Date Published: 13 September 2017 - 9:03 am
Authors: Martin Dittus
We’re sitting upstairs, hunched over a computer, and Martin is showing me the darknet. I guess I have as good an idea as most ...
Read More Introducing Martin Dittus, Data Scientist and Darknet Researcher -
Exploring the Darknet in Five Easy Questions
Date Published: 12 September 2017 - 8:59 am
Authors: Martin Dittus
Darknet marketplaces are typically set up to engage in the trading of illicit products and services, and are considered criminal in most jurisdictions. Image: ...
Read More Exploring the Darknet in Five Easy Questions
Press
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Xanax misuse: doctors warn of ’emerging crisis’ as UK sales rise
Date Published: 5 February 2018
Source: The Guardian
Researchers at the Oxford Internet Institute used data from a sample of the largest dark web marketplaces in 2017.
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Fentanyl Adds Deadly Kick to Opioid Woes in Britain
Date Published: 4 February 2018
Source: The New York Times
Britain accounts for the largest number of fentanyl sales on the limited access darknet in Europe, with 1,000 trades being made in recent months, research by the Oxford Internet Institute found.
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UK accounts for largest share of darknet fentanyl sales in Europe
Date Published: 16 October 2017
Source: The Guardian
The UK is the largest host of fentanyl sales on the darknet in Europe, with 1,000 trades being made in the last few months, OII research shows.