An insight into the sale of prescription drugs and medicine on the AlphaBay cryptomarket

Abstract

Internet access has provided new ways to trade goods. Unlike conventional legal sale sites, cryptomarkets facilitate exchanges in a context where the anonymity of participants is warranted. The aim of this article was to obtain a better understanding of the trafficking of prescription drugs and medicine on the AlphaBay cryptomarket. The results showed that alprazolam, oxycodone, and Adderall were the most offered prescription drugs while alprazolam, diazepam, and oxycodone were the most sold substances. The sale was dominated by North America, Australia, and Western European countries. The revenue of prescription drugs was estimated to be more than US$65 million since the creation of AlphaBay, a small market in comparison with offer a complementary way to understand the trafficking of prescription drugs and medicine and to identify the most prolific vendors and their implication in this trafficking.

Are Illicit Drugs a Driving Force for Cryptomarket Leadership?

“…The listed drugs are primarily for personal use or social networks including friends and colleagues, although most revenue comes from business-to-business dealings (Aldridge & Décary-Hétu, 2016; Barratt, 2012; Barratt et al, 2016; Demant et al, 2018). Some studies have investigated the geography of the vendors’ countries of origin and their destination countries, and revealed that cryptomarkets have primarily manifested in the Anglo-Saxon world and Western Europe (Christin, 2013; Demant et al, 2018; Dolliver, 2015; Morelato et al, 2020; Norbutas, 2018; Van Buskirk, Naicker, Roxburgh, Bruno, & Burns, 2016). The buyer-seller network is highly fragmented across geographical borders to reduce the risk of inspection (Aldridge & Askew, 2017; Broséus, Rhumorbarbe, Morelato, Staehli, & Rossy, 2017b; Kruithof et al, 2016; Norbutas, 2018).…”