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Customs seize Finnish silk road server

Finnish customs officials have confiscated servers running the Finnish drug-selling site Silkkitie (Silk Road) on the hidden Tor network.

Tullin kyltti.
Image: Ismo Pekkarinen / AOP
  • Yle News

The Silkkitie site, also known as Valhalla, began selling drugs and other illicit products on the dark web in 2013.

"This has been a very significant international operation," said customs official Hannu Sinkkonen, adding that the sting drew on multi-country collaboration.

While German, French, Canadian and American officials as well as Europol cooperated in the case, Sinkkonen did not reveal in which country authorities found the servers.

The seizure also turned up a considerable bitcoin cache valued in the hundreds of thousands of euros, according to Sinkkonen.

Sinkkonen said the confiscation took place earlier this year, leading Finnish drug-sellers to move their products to other illicit sites on Tor.

Silkkitie has produced a number of criminal investigations over the years in Finland as well as abroad. The preliminary investigation into the confiscated servers is still ongoing.