The Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) of the Frankfurt am Main Public Prosecutor's Office - Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) - together with the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) today arrested the administrator of the criminal online marketplace "Crimenetwork" and secured extensive evidence.
The 29-year-old accused is said to have worked as a "techmin", i.e. technical administrator, for the platform. In the course of this, he is said to have been responsible for the entire IT infrastructure of the platform and for the maintenance of the system.
For many years, "Crimenetwork" was one of the central trading places of the German-speaking underground economy. Stolen data, drugs and forged documents were traded there, among other things. Most recently, more than 100,000 users were registered on the trading platform. According to the BKA, the platform's customers came predominantly from German-speaking countries.
Payments via the platform were made using the cryptocurrencies Bitcoin and Monero. The alleged operators - including the administrator who has now been arrested - are said to have received commission payments of one to five percent of the sales value for processing the sales. They generated additional income by charging the sellers monthly fees.
As part of the police measures that were taken, which were supported by international law enforcement authorities, the BKA was able to secure extensive user and transaction data, which provide valuable investigative approaches for further clarification of the criminal structures behind the platform.
Logo of the CC measure's success banner
Other successes of the BKA in the fight against cybercrime
In order to combat cybercrime in the long term, personal investigations, i.e. the identification and successful prosecution of criminals, are an important and effective approach. However, since cybercriminals often reside abroad and are tolerated or even protected by some countries, they often remain inaccessible to German law enforcement. The measures taken by the German law enforcement authorities are therefore also aimed at weakening or destroying the technical infrastructure of cybercriminals. This infrastructure approach has already enabled considerable success in the fight against organized cybercrime. In addition, considerable financial resources were withdrawn from the so-called underground economy in the course of the investigations. In addition, IT systems and data were repeatedly seized, which led to further investigations.
The success of "Operation Endgame" in 2024 can be seen as the biggest blow to date against global cybercrime actors. Numerous international partners worked together under the leadership of the BKA. As part of the operation, several of the most dangerous malware families were neutralized, ten international arrest warrants were issued and four people were provisionally arrested.
Also this year, 47 digital currency exchange services hosted in Germany, also known as "exchange services", which were used for criminal purposes, were shut down. These were platforms on which conventional currencies and cryptocurrencies could be exchanged.
In addition, two arrests in Germany and the shutdown of the online platform "Dstat.CC" contributed to the international operation "PowerOff". This was a central scene platform that, with a list and evaluation of stresser services, made it possible to carry out DDoS attacks quickly and easily, among other things.
In 2023, the server infrastructure of the world's top-selling crypto mixer on the darknet, ChipMixer, was also seized and the equivalent of around 90 million euros was secured at the time. In addition, the infrastructure of several criminal marketplaces was seized - including Kingdom Market. In addition, the malware Qakbot was taken offline in 2023 and Emotet in 2021. Both were among the top threats from cyberspace and caused damage amounting to several hundred million euros worldwide.
In 2022, the BKA shut down the world's largest darknet marketplace to date, "Hydra Market", and seized cryptocurrencies worth 23 million euros at the time. In the same year, several arrests were made, including the administrator of the platform "Germany in the Deep Web 3".
B-Net
