At least three times over 8 or 9 years, in 2016, 2018, and 2023, and maybe more times than that, you’ve owned the site enough to get these data.
The operator knows about it, doesn’t want you doing it, and has tried reasonably hard to stop you.
The operator still hasn’t found a reliable way to keep you from grabbing the data.
The operator still hasn’t stopped keeping a bunch of full order data on the server.
They haven’t just stopped saving the orders at all, maybe because they need details to maximize collection on the scam, or because they see ongoing extortion value.
They haven’t started immediately moving every new order off of the server to someplace you can’t reach. I don’t know why they wouldn’t have been doing this all along.
Neither you nor any law enforcement agency worldwide have gotten the site shut down, at least not lastingly. Meaning, I assume, that one of the following is true--
Neither you nor law enforcement can shut it down, at least not for long enough to matter. Which would mean that, in spite of not being able to keep you away from the hit list, the operator has managed to keep you and them from--
Getting any data from the server that might let one trace the operator. That might be just the server’s real public IP address if the operator were careless enough.
Tracing the operator by other means, like Bitcoin payments, even though it would take really unusually good OPSEC to have not made any Bitcoin mistakes since 2016. And having people’s cars torched can easily leave traces, too.
Finding and disrupting a long-term operational point of failure, like an inability to reconstitute the service on a new host, or total reliance on a stealable and unchangeable hidden service key.
Or both you and law enforcement have held off for years, hoping for the operator to make a mistake that lets you trace them, as opposed to just the server, but you’ve failed.
Or you and/or they have held off in the hope of getting more order data and thereby warning more victims.
Or you could shut the site down or disrupt it, but law enforcement can’t figure out how. Either they haven’t asked your help or you’ve refused it (presumably for one of the above reasons).
Even though you’ve repeatedly taken the order list, the operator is confident enough of staying untraced to keep running the site for years.
If I ran something like that and my order data got stolen even twice, I would take that as a signal to shut down and go into hiding. And if somebody had it together enough to keep themselves untraceable while running that kind of thing for 8 years, I wouldn’t expect you to be able to get the list even once.
On edit: or wait, are you saying that this site acts, or pretends to act, as an open-market broker, so the orders are public? That’s plausible but really, really insane...
The situation begins to seem confusing.
At least three times over 8 or 9 years, in 2016, 2018, and 2023, and maybe more times than that, you’ve owned the site enough to get these data.
The operator knows about it, doesn’t want you doing it, and has tried reasonably hard to stop you.
The operator still hasn’t found a reliable way to keep you from grabbing the data.
The operator still hasn’t stopped keeping a bunch of full order data on the server.
They haven’t just stopped saving the orders at all, maybe because they need details to maximize collection on the scam, or because they see ongoing extortion value.
They haven’t started immediately moving every new order off of the server to someplace you can’t reach. I don’t know why they wouldn’t have been doing this all along.
Neither you nor any law enforcement agency worldwide have gotten the site shut down, at least not lastingly. Meaning, I assume, that one of the following is true--
Neither you nor law enforcement can shut it down, at least not for long enough to matter. Which would mean that, in spite of not being able to keep you away from the hit list, the operator has managed to keep you and them from--
Getting any data from the server that might let one trace the operator. That might be just the server’s real public IP address if the operator were careless enough.
Tracing the operator by other means, like Bitcoin payments, even though it would take really unusually good OPSEC to have not made any Bitcoin mistakes since 2016. And having people’s cars torched can easily leave traces, too.
Finding and disrupting a long-term operational point of failure, like an inability to reconstitute the service on a new host, or total reliance on a stealable and unchangeable hidden service key.
Or both you and law enforcement have held off for years, hoping for the operator to make a mistake that lets you trace them, as opposed to just the server, but you’ve failed.
Or you and/or they have held off in the hope of getting more order data and thereby warning more victims.
Or you could shut the site down or disrupt it, but law enforcement can’t figure out how. Either they haven’t asked your help or you’ve refused it (presumably for one of the above reasons).
Even though you’ve repeatedly taken the order list, the operator is confident enough of staying untraced to keep running the site for years.
If I ran something like that and my order data got stolen even twice, I would take that as a signal to shut down and go into hiding. And if somebody had it together enough to keep themselves untraceable while running that kind of thing for 8 years, I wouldn’t expect you to be able to get the list even once.
On edit: or wait, are you saying that this site acts, or pretends to act, as an open-market broker, so the orders are public? That’s plausible but really, really insane...
The data is not public. I accessed it anyhow. Perhaps you want to listen to the podcast to get a fuller chronology, I have not written it up yet.