The Use of Discord Servers to Buy and Sell Drugs

Abstract

The focus of current research on social media drug markets is the use of mainstream platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram. No research currently exists examining how lesser-known social media platforms may facilitate online drug supply. This paper presents the first analysis of the use of the social media platform Discord to buy and sell illegal drugs. The study utilizes observational data and qualitative interviews with Discord drug market participants in New Zealand, including sellers and a drug server administrator ( n = 12). Our findings demonstrate that the Discord platform, which was initially established for gaming, is also being used to facilitate drug transactions. Discord is used to establish local drug selling groups called “servers,” which can be joined by accessing an “invite-link.” The advantages of Discord drug servers cited by interviewees included competitive prices and the ability to greatly expand local seller and customer bases beyond pre-existing personal networks. However, accessibility, server size and management varied considerably between drug servers, giving rise to a range of issues and concerns. We use drug market typologies based on theory of “open” and “closed” markets to understand how “lower tier” and “higher tier” Discord drug servers provided different buying and selling environments. “Lower tier” drug servers were generally characterized by greater ease of entry, larger size, higher rates of opportunism among participants and variable server management. Conversely, “higher tier” drug servers typically involved tighter market entry controls, more active server management and were generally smaller in size. The emergence of Discord drug servers illustrates how the evolution of social media platforms presents their users with new spaces that can be adapted to function as drug markets and the tensions that may emerge during the process of learning to buy and sell in a new social media space.

Social Supply and the Potential for Harm Reduction in Social Media Drug Markets

“…The ease of accessing different drug types on social media was commonly cited by interviewees as an important advantage of using social media and messaging apps for drug trading. Drug accessibility and choice of product have previously been emphasized as particularly high in larger, competitive selling groups on Facebook, Messenger, and Discord, among others (Bakken & Demant, 2019; van der Sanden et al, 2022b). In our study, participants using social media primarily to purchase drugs via existing social networks also cited ease of access to different drug types (see also, Bakken & Demant, 2019).…”

“…Additionally, McCulloch and Furlong (2019) have emphasized the potential for buyers using anonymous sellers on social media to gather information by looking at factors like the number of account followers (association affordances), and examining their posts and profiles (visibility affordances) and comments left from previous buyers (communication, association, and visibility affordances). The latter dynamic indicates a type of informal “review system,” which has been documented as commonplace on more anonymous, competitive social media drug markets, providing buyers and sellers with a pathway to reducing the potential for victimization in these contexts (Bakken & Demant, 2019; van der Sanden et al, 2022b).…”

“…This article presents a qualitative analysis of anonymous interviews with people who use social media to buy or sell drugs in New Zealand. The study is part of a broader project considering the impact of social media and darknet drug markets in New Zealand (see also van der Sanden et al, 2021van der Sanden et al, , 2022avan der Sanden et al, , 2022b. Online chat-based interviews (Bakken, 2022;Barratt, 2012;Gibson, 2020) were carried out from July 2020 to September 2021.…”

“…However, most current research has focused on the latter, that is, impersonal, “profit driven” (Moeller, 2022) social media drug markets characterized by ease of entry and transactions between strangers. Examples include Facebook selling groups (Demant et al, 2019), Discord drug servers (van der Sanden et al, 2022b), and anonymous seller profiles on platforms like Instagram and Snapchat (McCulloch & Furlong, 2019). Impersonal social media drug markets have also been disproportionately reported in the media (e.g., Adkisson, 2022; Nichols, 2020).…”

“…The potential for increased access to more commercial seller types among young New Zealanders who engage with social media drug markets was illustrated in a recent study of Discord drug servers. Barriers to entering many of these spaces were low, but young people often contended with a melting pot of different seller types, including alleged gang-affiliates, and high levels of opportunism among members (van der Sanden et al, 2022b). New Zealand patched gangs 2 have historically been linked to local organized crime, specifically the emergence and expansion of the methamphetamine trade since the early 2000s (e.g., Gilbert, 2013; Newbold, 2016).…”