There’s a new avenue darknet market (DNM) customers have found that allows them to purchase illegal wares 24 hours a day via a robot drug dealer hosted on Telegram. The platform dubbed ‘Televend,’ is an automated software program that peddles illicit narcotics for people paying with bitcoin and during the last few months, the complex system has grown massively.
While many darknet markets have fallen to the wayside, a slew of new types of methods when it comes to selling illegal drugs online has risen. For instance, the world’s largest DNM in Russia, Hydra, leverages a complicated system of vendors who utilize drop zones. Additionally, a great number of DNM customers have used messenger applications like Facebook Messenger, Signal, Telegram, Whatsapp, and others to procure some drugs.
More recently, DNM users have been leveraging a new messenger route that utilizes a Telegram software program or bot called “Televend” to facilitate drug trades.
It’s not too hard to locate the relevant Televend links in order to catch a glimpse at this growing black market platform. According to the program’s learning channel, there are a number of obstacles one must complete before leveraging the Televend route. The channel’s pinned message also gives a brief description of what the bot does and how drug vendors can use the app.
“Televend is an auto-shop bot network for direct dealers, we administer the bots and vendors run them like private shops,” the channel’s message reads. “Customers can visit them and pay with bitcoin, track orders and payments, plus leave feedback and ratings. Vendors control the listings and configuration of their bot via a .onion Tor-based control panel so no Telegram account is needed to vend. At this control panel, they can add listings, process
