DARKMARK

dollars by reselling 'dumps and fulls', credit-card numbers with their PINs and the three digits on the back of the card. Cha0 in Turkey created a veritable factory of criminal activity, cashing out cloned credit cards, selling 'skimmers' around the world to other thieves so that they could steal card data on their own.

Darkmarket.com was founded in May 2005, but in the first few months of its existence it was a fairly lifeless affair. In the autumn of that year, however, it attracted some significant figures from other carding boards. The most energetic of all was JiLsi, the hacker from Sri Lanka, who had already founded one site, The Vouched, and had achieved moderator status on mazafaka's small but influential English-language section.

Before long, JiLsi had been appointed global moderator on DarkMarket, one rung below the kingpin status of administrator. He took it upon himself to elevate DarkMarket's profile. His aim was the same as Iceman's with CardersMarket – JiLsi wanted it to be recognised as the top criminal website in the English-speaking world. Working tirelessly from the Java Bean Internet café in north London, he succeeded in attracting hundreds of new members by May 2006. They were mainly English-speakers, although a number of Russians floated in and out as well.

Just as the site was becoming popular among carders the world over, its original founders decided to bring an end to DarkMarket because they feared its penetration by the security services. One of them even worried that it was becoming too successful. JiLsi and his friends wished to build on its growing reputation and simply reregistered the site as darkmarket.ws (the country domain for Western Samoa).

Now they could really get to work. Along with JiLsi, DarkMarket boasted the sponsorship of a renowned Russian hacker who went under the name of Shtirlitz, a veteran from CarderPlanet, who acted as a bridge between the Russian carding sites and DM.

There were others. Matrix001 had a look around DM. His reputation as a specialist in graphic design had been growing since he became a member of the International Association for the Advancement of Criminal Activity. He was unimpressed by what he saw – the message board was clunky and its security poor. He sent the administrator JiLsi a blunt message, pointing out that enemies like Iceman were hacking the website on a daily basis due to the inadequate software. Matrix offered