"Expired, Tired, Wired": The Shift from Tor to Telegram
The traditional view of the dark web—onion sites accessed via Tor—is becoming obsolete for large-scale financial crime. A new analysis reveals that Chinese-language Telegram channels have grown into the largest illicit marketplaces in history, dwarfing predecessors like Silk Road and AlphaBay.
The Scale of Operations
- Huione Guarantee: Facilitated $27 billion in transactions (2021-2025).
- Tudou Guarantee: Processing ~$1.1 billion monthly.
- Xinbi Guarantee: Processing ~$850 million monthly.
- Comparison: AlphaBay peaked at $1B lifetime; Hydra at $5B lifetime.
Open-Air Criminality
Unlike Tor markets that require specialized browsers, these syndicates operate in plain sight on Telegram. They utilize the platform's lax moderation and encrypted messaging to coordinate industrial-scale money laundering.
The "Pig Butchering" Industrial Complex
These markets do not primarily sell drugs; they sell the infrastructure for fraud. They fuel the "pig butchering" (Sha Zhu Pan) scams, a form of investment fraud that generates over $10 billion annually from US victims alone.
Services Traded
The ecosystem is highly specialized, offering tools to streamline scam operations.
- Money Laundering: USDT-to-Fiat conversion services.
- Scam Kits: Fake crypto investment websites and trading platforms.
- Deepfake Tools: AI software to bypass KYC or impersonate targets.
- Human Trafficking: Trading of forced labor for scam compounds.
Infrastructure of Impunity: USDT and Resilience
The preferred currency of these markets is Tether (USDT) on the Tron network, favored for its stability and speed compared to Bitcoin. Despite Tether's centralized ability to freeze funds, the volume of illicit flows suggests a lack of aggressive intervention.
The "Whack-a-Mole" Failure
In mid-2025, Telegram banned major players like Huione Guarantee following US Treasury sanctions. However, the ecosystem proved resilient. Huione rebranded, while competitors Tudou and Xinbi absorbed the volume, growing to fill the vacuum within months.
- ➔ Bans are temporary; markets rebuild quickly.
- ➔ Telegram refuses blanket bans on these networks.
- ➔ Syndicates frame their activity as "evading capital controls."
References
Wired Magazine, Elliptic Blockchain Analytics, FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center.
Strategic Assessment
The darknet has evolved. The technical barrier to entry has lowered, moving from Tor to Telegram, while the scale of financial crime has exploded. Law enforcement strategies focused on seizing onion servers are ineffective against this decentralized, resilient Telegram-USDT nexus.
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