An Anonymous Site Called 'Utopia' Is Replacing Silk Road As The Web's One-Stop Shop For Guns, Drugs, And Fake Money

Silk Road is certainly the most famous place online to buy your less-than-legal materials - the site operates on the TOR network, which anonymizes its traffic, and conducts all transactions in Bitcoin, the equally anonymous digital currency.

The site became even more famous after the arrest of Ross Ulbricht, the alleged owner and operator, who was charged with facilitating drug deals.

Now a new marketplace is up and running. It's called Utopia, and it has Silk Road users intrigued.

Users report that the site loads much more quickly than Silk Road (perhaps a function of it being a newer site not yet discovered by the swarm). Additionally, the site doesn't have the same CAPTCHA login error that's been driving Silk Road users nuts.

There are few differences of substance here. It's still a place to buy stuff when you don't want the seller (or parents, teachers, and law enforcement) to know who you are. Time will tell if it grows enough for Silk Road to feel any sort of pinch, or for law enforcement to take an interest.

In the meantime, here is what you can see on the site.