Incognito Market founder arrested in New York

A 23-year-old man from Taiwan was arrested for selling tens of millions of dollars worth of illegal drugs online through a darknet website called “Incognito Market.”

Rui-Siang Lin, also known as “Pharoah,” was arrested at New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport on Saturday and was scheduled to appear in court on Monday, the Justice Department said.

“As alleged, Rui-Siang Lin was the architect of Incognito, a $100 million dark web scheme to traffic deadly drugs to the United States and around the world,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.

According to the Justice Department, the Incognito Market, which closed in March, was an online dark web marketplace that allowed users to buy and sell illegal drugs anonymously.

Hundreds of kilograms (pounds) of cocaine, methamphetamines and other drugs have been sold at Incognito Market since its launch in October 2020, it said.

“Under the promise of anonymity, Lin’s alleged operation offered to purchase lethal drugs and fraudulent prescription drugs on a global scale,” said James Smith, assistant director in the FBI’s New York office.

Incognito Market users were able to search thousands of listings for illegal narcotics, including heroin, cocaine, LSD, MDMA, oxycodone, methamphetamine, ketamine, and alprazolam.

Sellers paid five percent of the purchase price of each sale to Incognito Market, giving Lin millions of dollars in profits, the Justice Department said.

Lin faces life in prison if convicted of drug conspiracy.

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