How many dark web marketplaces actually exist? About 100.

It turns out the dark web is pretty small. Despite a years-long drumbeat of sensational headlines and high profile arrests implying there’s an abundance of criminal masterminds lurking in the hidden corners of the internet, the reality is that the number of sites makes up less than 0.005 percent of the number of web pages on the open internet, according to new research. In findings set to be published Tuesday, the threat intelligence company Recorded Future sought to map the number of so-called .onion sites reachable via the anonymity browser Tor. Researchers found 55,828 different onion domains, and only 8,416 were active, though it’s not clear exactly how many of those are used for criminal activity, Garth Griffin, Recorded Future’s director of data science, told CyberScoop. “We know there are [roughly] 100 live onion sites that are part of the active criminal underground as either high-tier criminal forums, lower-tier but […]

The post How many dark web marketplaces actually exist? About 100. appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading How many dark web marketplaces actually exist? About 100.

Dark web intelligence competition escalates as Terbium raises $2 million from Omidyar Network

The Omidyar Network, an investment firm created by eBay and First Look Media founder Pierre Omidyar, has invested $2 million in Terbium Labs, the dark web intelligence company announced Monday. Terbium has raised $19 million from sources including Glasswing Ventures, which invested $6 million in 2017, and .406 Ventures, the company said in a statement Monday. The $2 million investment from the Omidyar Network comes as competition among dark web vendors has intensified, with competitors like Recorded Future, Digital Shadows and Flashpoint also scouring hidden sections of the internet for client information. Terbium utilizes artificial intelligence algorithms to model the dark web, locate new sites and predict where stolen information is most likely to go up for sale next, the company said. More than 10,000 users including Mastercard and Thomson Reuters use Matchlight, Terbium’s dark web search system, according to  Terbium. The company also relies on a fuzzy hashing protocol that […]

The post Dark web intelligence competition escalates as Terbium raises $2 million from Omidyar Network appeared first on CyberScoop.

Continue reading Dark web intelligence competition escalates as Terbium raises $2 million from Omidyar Network