Incognito Market: Trust Among Criminals?

Oliver Schilke, Maria Arantes, Gabriel Rossman

Product #:W39470

Supplier:Ivey

Discipline:General Management, Information Systems

Setting:2024

Details:Case (PDF) • 5 pages • 2025-01-06

Subjects:

Industries:

Information technology and telecom sector

Your Price:

$9.71

Language:

Format:

Purchase this material with a free Educator Account and enjoy more benefits:

Free Educator Copy
Free Teaching Notes
Build your coursepack
Discounted academic price

The Incognito Market was a notorious dark web marketplace that operated from 2020 to 2024, facilitating over US$100 million in illegal transactions. Founded by the enigmatic “Pharaoh,” this platform thrived by leveraging sophisticated trust-building mechanisms among criminals. However, in early 2024, Pharaoh executed an exit scam that evolved into an extortion scheme, threatening to expose user data unless ransoms were paid, highlighting the complexities of trust in illicit markets and the ethical challenges posed by such environments. How should vendors and buyers have responded? And how can trust be established in high-risk or unregulated environments, including legal marketplaces in countries with low state capacity and rule of law?

Learning Objectives

This case study is designed for undergraduate and graduate students, particularly those enrolled in courses related to business ethics, cybersecurity, and organizational design. It is also suitable for executive education programs focusing on digital transformation and risk management. After working through the case, students will be able to do the following:

Analyze how trust is built and maintained in the absence of traditional legal protections.
Discuss the ethical dilemmas and legal implications of participating in and regulating dark web markets.
Identify and evaluate the security protocols used by Incognito and their effectiveness both for actual security and for conveying the subjective belief in security.
Understand the psychological and financial effects of exit scams on users and the broader implications for digital commerce.
Apply lessons from the case to an understanding of legal platforms.