In mid-July, Scottish police raided a property in Paisley in the county of Renfrewshire while US officials, working in conjunction with online authorities, shut down an online criminal forum that has been described by US authorities as “one of the gravest threats” to cybersecurity.
The criminal forum website, darkcode.com, was shut down nearly two weeks ago, however, according to Wired Magazine and a number of other online sources, it is “back and more secure than ever”, as ‘darkcode.cc’.
According to a recent post by someone affiliated with the criminal forum, “Most of the staff is intact, along with senior members. It appears the raids focused on newly added individuals or people that have been retired from the scene for years.”
During the raid material linked to the forum was confiscated by Scottish police, however, despite the presence of ‘criminalising’ material, no arrests were made in Paisley.
More than 28 arrests were made globally, however, including a 26 year-old man in Coventry who was arrested by the West Midlands Regional Organised Crime Unit.
Cybercrime is on the rise in Scotland, as it is in all countries around the world, with the rise in local cybercriminal activity leading to a recent investment of £1.5 million in a new state-of-the-art cybercrime facility in Edinburgh.
It is reported that there has been a 47 percent increase in the demand for digital forensic examinations in Scotland over the past two years.
Says the head of Crime and Operational Support, Deputy Chief Constable Iain Livingstone. “Very few investigations today do not have a digital aspect to them – the darker side of the web is all too evident for us to see on a daily basis, whether it relates to the sharing of illegal images of children, online grooming, radicalisation, orchestrating serious organised crime or cyber-bullying.”