Showing posts with label The Silk Road. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Silk Road. Show all posts

Monday, February 10, 2014

The Silk Road 2.0



It’s been 4 months since Silk Road 2.0 was released. Can we assume it is now safe to shop? The

original incarnation of the Silk Road died with the arrest of Dread Pirates Roberts (DPR). But dark web visitors rejoiced when Silk Road 2.0 came to life after a little over a month of being off-line. Unfortunately, less than two months passed before more arrests were made. The current DPR has been noticeably silent and a new administrator that goes by the name Defcon appears to have taken over managerial duties, posting announcement and messages on the homepage. As of today, there is one that reads “If you had an order in escrow before break began, be sure to read Defcon's full announcement before using the marketplace.” Silk Road administrators claim that the site is now able to seamlessly transition between managers, even if the current DPR is taken into custody. The supposed failsafe system was implemented by uploading portions of the Silk Road to “over 500” backup servers around the world. If one server goes down, or is seized by authorities, then another one can take its place within minutes. DPR’s announcement “We now have over 500 independent backups with keyholders in 17 countries. Whack-a-mole will not work. Time for an open, frank discussion.” was release on Twitter back in December and is meant to assure customers, and warn law enforcement, that the system cannot be stopped.
The new Silk Road is an improved version of the original, offering heightened security for those looking to purchase illegal contraband like narcotics and paraphernalia. The Silk Road operates using the Tor browser, protecting the identity of its visitors by blocking their IP addresses, and uses the encrypted e-currency, bitcoins. Both are effective tools against the preying eyes of law enforcement, protecting the identity of all users. 

Although there are other sites on the dark web offering the sale of scheduled narcotics, many of them have proven to be unreliable or flat-out scams. None have been able to offer the same quality of service or variety of products. The Silk Road operates more like its surface web counterpart, including a rating system for sellers and buyers (think: ebay or Amazon), escrow for financial transactions and a forum to rate and discuss the quality of service and products.

The name of the administrator, (or former administrator, as the case may be) Dread Pirate Roberts, is a reference to The Princess Bride. The Dread Pirate Roberts was not one single man, but a persona taken on by a chosen successor to the last Roberts, perpetuating the legend of the dreaded pirate captain. The last Roberts, aka Ross Ulbricht, fell to the folly of greed. He was arrested on October 2, 2013 on multiple accounts of drug trafficking, hacking and even two for-hire kills.
On the surface, not much has changed from the original Silk Road to new and improved version. The most significant change is the added security feature which allows users to use their PGP encryption key for added authentication. One moderator, who goes by the name Synergy, wrote “Silk Road 2.0 will be reborn better, much much more secure as testament to the tenacity and determination of this wonderful community of ours. We will not be down trodden, we will rise again.”
 
The black market bizarre now has thousands of items for sale, including everything from marijuana to china white heroin. It’s tempting to dive back in and start shopping! But with all the turmoil over the last few months, it might be wise keep an eye on things, before dumping a ton of money into bitcoins. I have faith that the drug using members of society will persevere and prevail, but what road bumps the DEA and other law enforcement agencies will throw our way is yet to be seen. The War on Drugs is not over, but I’m confident the people on drugs are winning.



Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Silk Road Pt. 1


Okay – I’ve outlined some of my experiences on the Silk Road (or SR as sometimes refer to) and although this is lengthy, there is a large amount of information for someone who is serious about using it for the first time. I don’t go into the technical how-to’s of setting up Tor, but I’m happy to answer any questions about that if you start the process and have difficulty. But just a couple of words on it… Be Smart. Don’t try to put it on your work computer (duh!). You need to use a computer where you can control the proxy settings. And don’t underestimate the value of a thumbnail drive vs. your hard drive. There will be no trace of Tor while not in use, if you remove the thumb drive after each use.

An example of the front page of the Silk Road
I've put in a dozen or so orders by now - usually multiple orders at a time to use up all the bitcoins I’ve deposited in my account at once. That way they don’t linger around temping one of the numerous hackers (Tor is littered with them) who search the Silk Road for bitcoins sitting around unused. You will see there is a section where you can by money and bitcoins. Where do you think those bitcoins are coming from? Mostly from accounts that leave a balance available at any given time. I’m sure you don’t want that to be you! Also, the bitcoins process takes some time to complete (especially the first time) and there are so many fees associated with each transaction that I try to deposit large sums of money and then quickly make large purchases within the same day.

I would say that the vast majority of my transactions have run smoothly and been completely successful. But the first few undoubtedly made me a little nervous. Eventually they all worked out, but with each order something out of the ordinary happened. Odd packages started to arrive, unsolicited - including a string of random drugs, definitely not purchased, arrived in the mail – but more on that later. The first time was the oddest - and definitely the creepiest. Admittedly, I made a couple n00b mistakes, which might have triggered some of these events. This is why I’m writing all of this – so anyone who wants to journey down the Silk Road, can have access to a manual of sorts - an instruction guide, riddled with some humorous personal antidotes.

My first purchase, I ordered a vile of acid. It was a 250 drop vile at 50mg a drop. The seller was from the Netherlands and requested a no bitcoin transaction, PayPal preferred – an EXTREMELY odd request on the SR and one I have not seen repeated since. However at the time I didn’t realize just how unusual this was. I didn’t do a lot of research before my first purchase, I got too excited and jumped right in with a large purchase immediately after joining (yeah, yeah impatient, I know). But I could tell that the bitcoin process was initially going to take a few days to set up, so I was just stoked to see something I could pull the trigger on immediately. And a huge vile of acid, which was exactly what I was looking for! No more buying 10 strips on lots or going through one of the two people I know who can sometimes provide a sheet. This was going to last me for a while! (It was gone in like two months – but that’s inconsequential to the story. Just shows that I like my acid. Quite a bit.) Especially since I already had a full sheet as well as 50 drops in a vile a friend scored me in NY. I prefer liquid acid, because my ideal route of administration is IV, so it bypasses the step required to soak the LSD out of the strip. Makes it much easier… but anyway… back to the Silk Road.

Listings of LSD available with picture, seller info, pricing, etc
As I just mentioned, 99.9% (in not 100% these days) of SR transactions are done with bitcoins. Supposedly they are completely anonymous, protecting your identity from all purchases. *NOTE: There is some debate over how autonomous bitcoins really are. But for our purposes, they actually do offer the most superior protection available. But we’ll delve into this later towards the end.) Once you pay for an item with bitcoins, your purchase goes into and you don’t have to fully release the funds until your order is received. Sellers do have the option to accept escrow payments or not, but if you release early the fault lies on you and there is no further protection from SR. But buying any product from the Silk Road is much like eBay, as you will see in the included photographs. All sellers are given ratings from the buyer after the transaction, and you can pick who you want to do business with based on those ratings – number of stars, description of personal communication, number of positive ratings, how long they have been active on SR and how their product is reviewed. Then, if you are smart, you pick sellers with a large number of high (perfect) ratings. You want to pick a seller that has a 100 ratings, because there are many ways to fool the system and these are drug dealers you are working with after all. Some people put their product up, have their buddies purchase a few times, acquire some positive reviews, convince the next potential buyers to release escrow early, then disappear after they have received the cash. This has happened to me once on the SR when I wanted to sample a 10 strip. But this business happens all the time on every drug buying forums, be it topix, oxyforum or the Silk Road. (Not to mention the scammers you run across when buying drugs in real life, especially when copping on the streets!) There are always going to be scammers. So 1 time out of 20 or so purchases I still consider pretty good odds!

Anyway – the most reputable sellers have no problem selling in escrow, but there are some completely legit sellers who request early release. In the end, the choice is yours. Do you want to purchase from someone requesting earlier release or not. There’s definitely risk involved, but I’ve done it for sellers with extremely high ratings by a large number of buyers and my transaction be completely smooth. Once you release funds and leave your review (which is required as funds are released – a big flaw in the SR still if you as my humble opinion), there is now no way to go back and change your remarks or communicate with other buyers how you were ripped off. Luckily, there is one more line of defense to protect yourself and all buyers, although it can be overlooked much of the time. There is a message board, a forum, where you can report fraudulent sellers and give a description of the transaction, communication and product – both good or bad. Most (maybe even all) reputable sellers have their own forum page. There are also threads listing all types of shady sellers as well.. This is your only option for recourse if you are scammed after waving escrow. But hopefully the product was FIRE and you want to fluff the seller with high praise.


Listing for Heroin #4 (China White) including description, reviews, picture, price and shipping info. Kinda makes my mouth water :)
An example of the Fake ID's for sale. One of many illegal things sold on the SR


Although drugs are by far the largest category on the Silk Road, there are many other illicit items for purchase as well. 


❤ ☮ & ♪♬

Friday, December 28, 2012

Silk Road Pt 3.


This the 3rd edition of my Silk Road posts!

So let's talk mushrooms. Those which are hallucinogenic in nature that is.... My strategy up until the Silk Road, was to stock up with any many as possible through out festie and tour season and try to accumulate enough to last me all fall winter, until the next heattie show came along with a good lot. This time, I decided to test out the product on the Silk Road - which I still plan on doing more of. Actually I want to start growing them, but that's a different story.

All the mushrooms – which were already a good price – from the Netherlands were about say 15bc. (I’m rough guessing the prices here since it doesn’t really matter - but at the time it was about 3bc =$1). Then there was this one guy offering his for almost half of that AND he shipped from the states, so free shipping! (and hopefully faster) I think standard shipping is always free within the states - at least it used to be. Although some sellers do offer the expedited shipping, that can be risky too. Not always a good idea to be able to track your drugs. And you don't want to have to sign for them and have proof floating out there somewhere that you signed for a package of Back Tar Heroin of whatever.  So despite the massive difference in price AND knowing the best product comes from the Netherlands (again in the category) we bought ½ oz of them. But it wasn't enough money to shed a tear over if something did go wrong. Sure enough, almost the next day they were there.  
 
***Here I am going to add a slight disclaimer. My view may be slightly askew due to an overuse, both long term (about 2 decades) and really heavy short term use (previous 6 months – a few times a week) to psychedelics. Clearly this will affect tolerance of each drug in and of itself, but should NOT produce cross-over tolerance between most of them. Although it has been theorized and some case studies have shown that certian RC's may produce slight cross tolerance between other psychedelics, mushrooms have never been included in those studies. Still, we did take an entirely different batch of mushrooms the weekend before and didn’t trip either. But the legitimacy of that product was never confimred. Although they looked, smelled, tasted and felt like legitimate shrooms, without at least another person verifying their potency, I couldn't make a blanket statement in either direction as to whether they were "real" or not.***

They came vacuum sealed and everything looked solid. Once I received them I let the seller know. He requested that I release the funds, which I was hesitant to do, since I hadn't tried them yet, but my last few transactions were so smooth, I figured "why not?". I gave the required 5 star but wrote "WAITING TO SAMPLE PRODUCT. WILL POST REVIEW IN FORUM WHEN VERIFIED."
We took them about 2 hours before and EOTO show in Tahoe, which was right across the street. We had with high expectations after such disappointing experiences with tripping on anything for the last 2 months. By the time we had to leave – all hope was abandoned. They never kicked in. We had all the effects of being on mushrooms without any of the actual visuals/body buzz/ euphoria/giddiness/tripping. So they had ALL of the slight uncomfortable feelings associated with mushies, slight tummy upset, desire to curl up in bed, bizarre equilibrium effect, social awkwardness, which usually passes in 30 minutes, transforming into social glee and laughter for me. But this lasted for the next few hours, with none of the fun side effects.  I know that Golden Teachers can vary in potency and strength – and obviously we both have an extremely high tolerance for pretty much all drugs in general. Maybe we could have tried more but we ate a lot to begin with. We don't shy away from those challenges. But with all of the positive reviews of this product, I was/am slightly suspicious that they hadn’t worked right off the bat. So, I figured I would give them to my bff who has no tolerance for this kinda thing at all, just to make sure that they didn’t work.  Haven’t heard anything about them from her yet (doubt I will now since she’s since “broken up" with me after 14 years, bitch). Hope they didn't work out for her either. Knowing her - she probably got freaked out by them and thew them away - whatever. Who cares. If I want to put a spike in my arm, that's my business.  Anyway - back to the Silk Road...

So - we got some more mushroom locally and decided to hold off trying them until our bodies were purged of psychedelics drugs. Even though there's supposedly no cross tolerance between L/Shrooms/RC’s etc. I've quite a bit of experience that would suggest otherwise, specifically with 2C products and that’s not supposed to happen either. 
The seller is still selling and the ratings are still coming in that they are high quality. So the rating system is clearly not a foolproof system. Or I was just a special case, and really need to cool off on my psychedelic drug intake. (which I have).

So I'm still winning the game overall - but it's by no means a sweep, with the SR scoring +2 points on me in the custie'd category.  Again, I made a mistake in judgment basing my decision on price and not taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture – why were they so cheap?? Why would I by from the state when I know they are sub-par to the Netherlands? Lesson Learned.


Next Purchase - MDMA – One of the best deals on the Silk Road

So again so time passes with a few smooth (even fun and enjoyable) transactions. Communication can be hit or miss with the sellers, but the product was always good, even if not always 100% accurate – at least effective.  And that’s all I ask for, really ;-)


All the MDMA experiences have actually worked out really well for me – even if it was weird. I f ound a great guy selling MDMA in Molly form and tested about as high as possible on the Reagent test, 84%.  It came in a standard time frame, great package, packaged as directed, good communication, A+ all around. Strike that, A++++++++++ when the next package came. A week after we took and had a BLAST on the amazing product, another shipment from the same town but different address came. Another bag of Mahl!  Okay – well that’s weird. This is my third shipment of mysterious, un-paid for drugs, only one of which was bad. I didn’t ask him about it because I didn’t want to raise any red flags, but we decided to take it anyway (contents unconfirmed) and rolled tits. So that was that and then I pretty much stopped thinking about that transaction. 


It was so good though, that we wanted another order ASAP for my birthday.  Fast forward 2-3 weeks later. I placed another order and as I mentioned earlier, I always place 3-6 items at a time. I had ordered a bag of 2C-E. I didn’t know the EXACT address it was supposed to come from but I remember it was at least some place on that side of the world (Netherlands).  In the appropriate time frame- a bag from the Netherlands (again) came with a baggie of unmarked clear white powder, 1 gr. 

Now, it makes sense that no one labels their drugs in the mail when they ship. And typically people don’t use their own home address, or at least their exact (or detailed) addresses, but it certainly makes it frustrating when you place multiple orders and are dealing with product that is similar in color and bitterness -like many RC's being sold today.  It gets confusing.  Then add the fact that 15mgs of one can flip your world upside down for 15 hours and be close to a dangerous overdose, and 20mgs - your pushing daisies, you need to be careful!


I decided to hold on to the bag for a little bit and see if maybe the other product would be easier to recognition. Strangely, I wound up with 4 random bags of white powder. Supposedly from two different sellers, but who knows maybe really coincidentally they worked together in conjunction on the Silk Road?

Now I had my entire order of products. The Mahly was the same fantastic roll. The 2C-E was awesome and combined with LSD, they make the Universe's hetty'est cocktail :)
but I'm still left with the unanswered question of "Where are all of these free drugs coming from?? And more importantly WHO IS SENDING THEM TO ME!!! Can all of this possibly be a dissociated string of coincidences? Doesn’t seem likely.

I did take the "risk" blindly sampling one of the random bags - turned out to be 2C-I and I tripped face off of it, quite a few times. Still have some actually - was going to save some for this NYE.

So there is nothing I can say about that specific mailing that would point to a conclusion. I'm really doubt I'll get an answer to any of this, but at least I came out the winner - I guess?  Over all I have wound up with way more drugs than I had actually purchased, but they were all legitimate, so  again – if the Universe wants to send me free drugs through mail order – who am I to complain? But still the whole thing can be hit or miss, and although appreciated, I’m always a little apprehensive when the random bags arrive. And although there have been a couple of orders where the seller has then disappeared, despite a large number of positive reviews, the overall success rate has me coming back. After all, it still beats the number of times I've been ripped off IRL copping on the streets or at Shakedown at a show. So I'll keep coming back!
One of the most common questions I receive about the Silk Road is "How does the pricing compare?" Well, that is completely dependent on what your are buying and where you live.


). Here is a general breakdown by most popular categories:

Psychedelics (Of all sorts - L, shrooms, RCs etc.): Normally much cheaper than I can find in and around California.
**Side besides my less than successful purchase of shrooms from the states, most shrooms almost always come from the Netherlands - this is a great (although not foolproof) way of securing a high quality product. I've honestly found this to be true for most products purchased from there – The Netherlands take the quality of their drugs seriously!**
Dissociative (Ketamine, MXE, PCP): Comparatively equal.  So I found no value in purchasing them through the Silk Road- unless you are unable to procure locally, or they just aren’t available in your area for some reason

Uppers - Depends.
Coke - Much pricier on SR but might be worth if for quality. They have a variety of EXTREMELY Superior coke available. But you’re gonna have to pay! (worth it IMHO)

Meth/Adderall - About the same locally. It's dirt cheap everywhere.

GHB:  Cheaper if you can buy in quantity.

MDMA - Seems to be the best overall Street/SR ratio. Really dirt cheap compared to the street value in Los Angeles. Also - ALWAYS (at least in my experience thus far) they have been highly superior to what you can buy on the streets. Since it’s almost all from the Netherlands (if it’s not, don’t buy it) you can still find early 90's standard ecstasy and they don't pass this shit "Molly" off as real AND it almost always comes with a Reagent Test results.

Opiates –
Heroin – This is an interesting one. When I started shopping on the Silk Road it was one of the best deals around. At least the Heroin was. It was much cheaper than Los Angeles street prices . You could go higher in value and buy China White or other super quality H when they had it - for much higher, but it WAS a rare commodity, Now #4 Heroin is littering the Silk Road. So it’s up to you and what you can get in your town as to whether it’s “worth it” or not. Maybe you are from the West Coast and get white powder in a stamp bag – you might be willing to buy at a higher price than someone who can get it on par or cheaper than the SR. Or you’ve never tried Mexican Black Tar, it would be in your best interest to give it a go an buy some at $100+ a gram, just to give it a shot over on the east coast. Yadda yadda, you get my drift.

Scripts - ALL OPIATE PRESCRIPTIONS ON SR ARE NOT WORTH IT. They may be high quality (and you can get OC's vs. OP's) but you will be prison rape on the price. Hands down one of the biggest rip offs - if you can secure elsewhere. But they are counting on getting the people who are uncomfortable buying from the streets or purchasing H at all. RE: Think your local soccer mom.

Opium – Completely hit or miss if they have it. They will go through dry spells of months at a time and then have 3 or 4 dealers at once selling. In my opinion, because of its scarcity.... if it's available, buy it! I've never had fake opium or anything that was sub-par quality from the SR, and when I do buy, I'll buy in bulk, just because I don't know when it's going to go away or come back again, and I love having it around. I had a guy I was buying from at a fairly expensive, but not outrageous price on SR, but he told me he had to close shop because the processing of the opium was getting way to expensive.  

Other – This “Other” category is very vague - anything else really. HGH's are one of the more popular- but I won't know how to compare prices - I think it's really high in demand though, because the stock seems endless and current. Psych drugs off all sorts, sleeping pills, barbiturates, ludes, crazy types of benzo’s etc.

I bought some Phenobarbital, randomly one day because I saw it and seemed to be a reasonably good price (actually dirt cheap) and isn't offered frequently in my circles - so that was worth it. I've been searching high and low to find Methaqualone, but have only found substitutes like Ettaqualone, but it's a crap shoot. You never know what random obscure drug that you've always wanted to try (or never heard of that piques your interest) so it's hit or miss. It seems that (like the ones I've mentioned above) since they are sold all over the world - to the point of abuse - across different countries, they will eventually be available to us at some point through the SR - so if there is some pill or drug you can’t find right away – keep checking in and be diligent. It’s most likely going to show up one day. And then it will be there for a day or two – or it might spark a new trend and gain its own category. You never know what’s going to happen!

So in conclusion to the pricing questions, I purchase by the following criteria that is important to me: price, local availability, quality vs price, dealer rating and perhaps novelty (like the Phenobarbital).

Hopefully that helps answer some of the questions you've had about the Silk Road and how that website works, what's available and how to buy, etc. As I mentioned, my next SR installment will be more technically driven and focus more on Tor, security, bitcoins etc. Please drop me comment if there is something specific you want addressed around those categories, and I'll try to get those questions answered first!

Hope everyone is having a great holiday vacation!!

❤ ☮ & ♪♬



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