FBI Takes Action Against Incognito Market
The FBI has taken significant action against an illicit drug market known as “Incognito Market,” which operated on the dark web. The crackdown led to the identification of the individual behind this operation, Lin Rui Xiang, a finance graduate from National Taiwan University.
Lin Rui Xiang’s Rise and Fall
Lin had cultivated an image as a cryptocurrency trader, boasting impressive trading statistics online and achieving a notable VIP Level 3 status, which denotes a trading volume surpassing $1 million each month.
However, his foray into the cryptocurrency scene took a drastic downturn when a group of hackers targeted him, employing deceptive tactics to infiltrate his account. This breach resulted in the loss of his virtual currencies and NFTs, plunging him into financial turmoil.
Lin established “Incognito Market” in 2020, successfully enlisting over 200,000 users worldwide, among them numerous drug traffickers, and facilitating drug sales that totaled over $100 million until law enforcement intervened in March 2024.
Reckless Decisions and Consequences
In a desperate move amidst this financial distress, Lin briefly shut down the market in early 2024 but quickly reinstated it, demanding extreme fees from users under the threat of revealing their identities unless they paid up to $20,000 as “hush money.” Many observers pointed out that his downfall was not just due to the hacking incident but also connected to his reckless pride in his trading persona across social media platforms, where he frequently shared details about his successes and failures.
Additionally, Lin’s misfortunes included the loss of popular NFTs like the “Bored Ape Yacht Club,” which have been valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars, further exacerbating his financial instability.
Following his extortion scheme, the reputation of Incognito Market severely deteriorated, leading to its eventual collapse.
