The Rhino Horn Crisis and the Darknet
Derek Mead
2013-01-24
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/rhino-horn-crisis-and-the-darknet...
While .onion has been around since 2004, the creation of the anonymous currency Bitcoin in 2009 helped give the .onion web a reputation as a marketplace for all kinds of illicit goods.
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I wrote him back asking how exactly he makes such massive transactions with strangers online, and found that bitcoin escrow services are a real thing, which does open up the possibility for trading ridiculous amounts of bitcoin with at least some sort of guarantee. He never responded to that query, but followed up by saying he had an offer for two of the horns.
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