What was taken down?
Marketplace servers and hidden service seized; site taken offline; assets and cryptocurrency frozen in multiple jurisdictions.[1][2]
See what happenedWhat happened to the people?
Officials reported 1 charged and 1 apprehended.
1 charged and 1 apprehended named in the public record.
Group accounted for: Likely complete
Did it stay down?
After this action a successor service took over the same demand, first seen July 2017. Medium confidence in the link between the two.
See what happened afterwardFBI-led seizure of AlphaBay, then the largest darknet marketplace, with simultaneous arrest of founder Alexandre Cazes in Bangkok by Royal Thai Police.[1][2]
Announced July 20, 2017.
- Date
- July 4 to July 5, 2017
- Target
- AlphaBay, tor hidden service marketplace
- Activity
- Darknet market, Fraud and stolen data, Cryptocurrency laundering
- Operational lead
- FBI and DEA
- Partners
- Europol, USAO-EDCA, and 1 more[1][2]
- European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation , coordinator
- United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California , charging
- Royal Thai Police , arresting
- Jurisdiction
- United States, Thailand, Canada, Lithuania, and Netherlands
- Outcome
- Marketplace servers and hidden service seized; site taken offline; assets and cryptocurrency frozen in multiple jurisdictions.
- Status
- Completed
- Legal mechanism
- US seizure and arrest warrants (Eastern District of California) plus Thai judicial cooperation and Canadian asset action
- Group accounted for
- Likely complete
Infrastructure
1 onion service seized. Servers seized, with no count in the record.
- 1
- onion service seized
| Identifier | Recorded as | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Not published | 1 onion service | Seized | AlphaBay hidden service taken offline and replaced with a seizure notice.[1] |
| Not published | Server | Seized | Servers seized in multiple countries including Canada, the Netherlands, and Lithuania.[1] |
Domains and onion addresses are shown defanged. Where the record gives a count but no identifier, the count is shown in place of one. This list carries only what appears in the cited sources.
- 1
- charged
- 1
- apprehended
Named in the public record: 1 charged and 1 apprehended.
Figures count individuals named in charging documents and official statements, each person once per outcome. People alleged to be involved but not publicly identified are not counted.
| Person | Role | Current public status |
|---|---|---|
| Founder and administrator of AlphaBay | ChargedArrestedDeceased | |
|
||
Alexandre Cazes
Founder and administrator of AlphaBay. Current public status: Charged, Arrested, and Deceased.
- Charging authority
- United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California
- Main charges
- Narcotics distribution conspiracy; Identity theft; Money laundering conspiracy
- Case number
- 1:17-CR-00144-LJO
- Arresting authority
- Royal Thai Police
- Arrest location
- Bangkok, Thailand
- Extradition status
- Not established in the public record
- Conviction or plea
- Not established in the public record
- Sentence
- Not established in the public record
- Segment
- Core operator
- Sources
- [1]
- Full record
- Everything indexed for Alexandre Cazes
Rows expand to show charging authority, case identifiers, custody status, and sources.
Group accounted for: Likely complete
The sole controlling administrator was arrested and the infrastructure seized. Subordinate staff were not comprehensively charged, so absolute certainty is not available.
Single founder-administrator with a small moderator and security staff; only the founder was publicly charged in the 2017 action.
Cazes died in Thai custody days after arrest; forfeiture proceedings continued.[1][2]
-
July 2017
Post-AlphaBay market ecosystem. Ecosystem successor. Confidence: Medium. Not established.[2]
Users migrated to Dream Market and other venues, which was the intended effect of the parallel Hansa operation.
July 2017
Post-AlphaBay market ecosystem. Ecosystem successor. Confidence: Medium. Not established.[2]
Users migrated to Dream Market and other venues, which was the intended effect of the parallel Hansa operation.
Return class E. The class is a research grading carried in the source dataset and its scale is not published, so this page relies on the relationship and confidence values instead. How this index handles it.
Numbered markers throughout this entry link to the source that supports the claim beside them.
Official sources
-
[1]
AlphaBay, the Largest Online 'Dark Market,' Shut Down
AlphaBay seizure, Cazes arrest and death, charges, scale figures
-
[2]
Massive blow to criminal dark web activities after globally coordinated operation
Joint AlphaBay and Hansa operation structure and coordination roles
- AlphaBay scale figures reported at announcement: over 200,000 users, roughly 40,000 vendors, roughly 250,000 listings.
- A later service using the AlphaBay brand appeared in 2021 under an alleged former staff member; recorded as a resurgence, not as continuity of this operator.