COVID-19 vaccines are continuously offered on dark markets

The progression of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign has not halted online illicit trade on the dark web. As of February 26 2021, we found 11 active COVID-19 vaccines on the dark web, including one listing selling the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, one listing the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine, and 9 listings selling vaccines of unspecified type. These listings are offered in five dark markets from ten vendors.

Multiple vendors offering COVID-19 vaccines in multiple markets challenge the efforts of law enforcement agencies, which have to stop many potential threats. Our analysis aims at raising the awareness of the phenomenon and increasing the chances of seizing counterfeit COVID-19 vaccines.

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Want to cite and/or use the information provided in this page? It is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 - please cite our ongoing monitoring effort as follows:

A. Bracci(+), M. Nadini(+), M. Aliapoulios, D. McCoy, I. Gray, A. Teytelboym, A. Gallo, A. Baronchelli. Dark Web Marketplaces and COVID-19: The vaccines. Preprint arXiv:2102.05470 (2021)

A. Bracci, M. Nadini, M. Aliapoulios, D. McCoy, I. Gray, A. Teytelboym, A. Gallo, A. Baronchelli. Dark Web Marketplaces and COVID-19: before the vaccine. EPJ Data Science 10.1 (2021): 1-26

(+) These authors contributed equally