South Korean Man Who Ran Child Exploitation Site Busted Using BTC Transactions

For right around three years, “Welcome To Video” was a secret nook for individuals who exchanged clasps of youngsters being explicitly attacked.

There, on the darknet’s biggest known site of child exploitation recordings, many clients from around the globe got materials that show the sexual maltreatment of children as young as a half-year old. At that point everything started to unwind.

The United States’ Department of Justice (DOJ) uncovered how it had pursued a trail of bitcoin exchanges to locate the associated overseer with the site: A 23-year-old South Korean man named Jong Woo Son.

Jong’s charges include scamming, illegal tax avoidance and creating, publicizing, and disseminating child pornography. Investigators are looking to hold onto 24 bitcoin having a place with the man, and removal from South Korea after he finishes a 18-month sentence there.

Specialists said they distinguished clients of the dark net site in 23 states and a wide scope of nations, including Britain, South Korea, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Spain, Brazil, and Australia.

“Dark net sites that profit from the sexual exploitation of children are among the most vile and reprehensible forms of criminal behavior,” Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski said in an announcement. “This administration will not allow child predators to use lawless online spaces as a shield.

“The Department of Justice remains firmly committed to working closely with our partners in South Korea and around the world to rescue child victims and bring to justice the perpetrators of these abhorrent crimes.”

Specialists said they utilized an advanced bitcoin tracing technique to discover the area of the dark net server, recognize the chairman and gain proficiency with his physical location in South Korea. Examiners around the globe shared data from held onto servers and saved 23 youngsters in the United States, Spain and Britain who were mishandled, the office said.

Welcome To Video’s downfall “is a clear indication that in cases like this, where there’s very low-hanging fruit, breaking encryption is not required,” said Christopher Parsons, a senior research associate at Citizen Lab, based at the University of Toronto’s Munk School.

“There’s a lot of a people who have this perception that bitcoin is totally anonymous, and it’s been the downfall of many people in many investigations,” Parsons said.