Darknet Fake ID Vendor “FakeIDDobby” Has Been Arrested In Germany
The German Federal Police has arrested a suspected trio for operating on various dark web marketplaces under the Fake ID vendor name “FakeIDDobby”.
The Federal Police Inspection for Combating Crime in Halle (Saale) had stated in a press release that the suspects had sold German Fake ID documents and Fake ID cards for Italy, Austria, Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary. They had used the vendor account “FakeIDDobby” on multiple dark web marketplaces such as Empire Market, Nightmare Market and WallStreet Market. The forged documents sale had provided a profit of nearly 45,000 euros.
The announcement has unveiled that the arrest of the suspected trio had resulted from the extensive investigations that had been conducted by The Public Prosecutor’s Office in Frankfurt am Main – Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) along with the Federal Police Inspection for Combating Crime in Halle (Saale) in cooperation with the Federal Criminal Police Office.
The investigation commenced back in 2019 following the investigators’ knowledge of the suspected trio’s listings for the dark web sale of the forged documents. The investigation has yielded the suspected identities’ discovery and sales transactions. Following this, the investigators had used the evidence for acquiring the search warrants against the properties of the suspects.
On the 20th of January 2021, the investigators had executed the search warrants on the three suspects’ residence and an office in Magdeburg that they had used as a forgery workshop for Fake ID. The raid had resulted in the seizure of the storage devices along with the forgery devices like the chemicals, foil elements, printing plates, printers and seals. The law enforcement agencies could also arrest and detain two suspects aged 24 years who had been charged with 140 counts of commercial documents forgery. The third suspect aged 23 years had been arrested and released as soon as the raids were completed.
The Chief Police Officer Romy Töwe, the police chief of the Federal Police Department for Combating Crime in Halle (Saale) stated:
“We are increasingly observing how the virtual space is used to commit crimes. The supposed protection of identity through anonymity is exploited by those involved to make prosecution more difficult Police and judicial authorities have in the past increased their digital skills in terms of personnel and technology. This process has shown that these efforts are paying off.”
If the suspects are found guilty of generating Fake ID and selling them in the aforesaid darknet markets, each of them could be sentenced to six months of minimum imprisonment that could go up to ten years at the maximum.
