In the new, app-based drug economy, there is no reliable method for either party to establish a positive reputation. On outlets like Silk Road, there’s feedback and reviews of buyers and sellers. On the street, customers and dealers can read each other face-to-face. Social media apps offer little information to go by when deciding which hashtag-riddled account of Snoop Dogg memes is going to have the better product. These days, if a smartphone app is social and location-based, you can guarantee there’s a dealer near you.īut proximity doesn’t guarantee anything for the consumer.
Right now, customers are buying product off Instagram, Grindr, Tinder, Whisper, Yik Yak, and more. With every round of busts, the marketplace operators, vendors, and buyers learn from the mistakes of others and find new ways to protect themselves from arrest or from being ripped off. In early 2011, Silk Road opened for business and darknet marketplaces proliferated across the web. Since 2010, the internet has facilitated countless illicit drug transactions, when the year-old “Adamflowers” marketplace moved onto the darknet and rebranded as “The Farmer’s Market,” the first major darknet marketplace for drugs. On particularly invincible nights out, they bought drugs from sketchy men in dark corners of the club. When I was younger, people bought drugs from friends.
