White House Market Announces It Will Retire, Administrator Says It Has Met Its Goals

One of the world's largest dark web marketplaces, White House Market (WHM), officially retired on October 1, 2021 after Dread announced that.

We have reached our goal and now, according to plan, it's time to for us to retire.

Effective immediately user registration and ordering have been disabled, everything else (yes, withdrawals included) is working as usual.

We will keep the market online for a limited time until open orders are finalized, disputes handled and coins withdrawn. We don't know how long that will take but don't expect to come back 6 months from now and find the market up.

All market rules are still in effect so users (both buyers and vendors) should not try to take advantage of the situation and scam, the feedback system is still working and will be shared with Recon and other markets.

Because this week's featured listings and stickies won't generate any revenue vendors who paid for them will be refunded via their market wallet.

Vendors can now advertise the markets where they operate on their vendor profiles however direct contacts are still disallowed.

For alternative markets check out /d/Superlist on Dread, the ones listed there are established and going strong. Keep in mind any market can disappear at any time and for what ever reason (exit scam, law enforcement operation, hack, technical issue and so on) but markets like Monopoly (true wallet-less, direct deal) and Versus (enforced multisig) greatly minimize damage. You can also give a chance to new markets, we all have to start somewhere.

Thanks everybody for your business, trust, support and of course for placing decent amounts of money in our pockets. We may come back some time in the future with a different project or we may not. Meanwhile be on the lookout for phishing or copycats, if it's not signed by us it's not us.

Good luck and stay safe.

At a time when most dark web marketplaces are being shut down by global law enforcement, WHM has become the second largest dark web marketplace after Russian dark web giant Hydra. WHM is also a Monroe Coin ( XMR ) only dark web marketplace, which means that XMR is the only digital currency accepted by vendors in WHM.

In the dark web marketplace scenario, most marketplaces typically run off with users' money (often referred to as exit scams) or go offline after an enforcement action. In the case of WHM, the marketplace "graciously" left the scene while locking in orders. This is unusual, to say the least.

Launched in August 2019, WHM has heavily dominated the dark web marketplace over the course of its 2 years of operation. Among the dark web exchange community, White House Marketplace was known for its strong security practices, such as enforcing all communications through PGP and accepting only XMR transactions. At the time of their retirement, WHM had 49,352 active product listings, approximately 3,450 active sellers, and a whopping 819,490 order reviews. It's safe to say that their absence will leave a significant void in the dark web marketplace economy.

In the farewell letter from WHM, the marketplace suggested that users migrate to certain specific types of dark web marketplaces. The marketplace commented, "Any marketplace can disappear at any time for any reason (exit scams, law enforcement actions, hacking, technical issues, etc.), but marketplaces like Monopoly (true walletless, direct transactions) and Versus (mandatory multi-signature) are considerably less damaged. You can also give new markets a chance; we all have to start somewhere."

In addition to WHM recommendation, we've seen an uptick in AlphaBay's popularity.

Last month saw the sudden resurgence of AlphaBay Marketplace, a marketplace that was immensely popular during its glory days (2014-2017). AlphaBay's online presence came to an abrupt halt after law enforcement tracked down the marketplace's administrators and servers hosting the marketplace.

In its heyday, AlphaBay was ten times the size of its predecessor, Silk Road (which was destroyed in October 2013). With more than 369,000 product listings, 400,000 users, and facilitating between $600,000 and $800,000 in transactions per day, the marketplace had reportedly built a solid reputation.

Now that DeSnake, AlphaBay's former administrator, has relaunched the famed dark web marketplace, is the retirement of WHM the boost he needs to bring AlphaBay back to its glory days? Some Dread users seem to think so.

In addition to AlphaBay, monero (XMR) users can still access the dark web marketplace called Archetyp Market in order to use XMR. In addition, there are a number of dark web marketplaces that offer a mix of BTC and XMR options. versus Market, Cannazon, Tor 2 Door, Cypher Market, Cannazon, Tor 2 Door, Cypher Market, and Revolution offer BTC and XMR by choice, while the administrators of Monopoly Market, Dark0de, ASAP Market, World Market, Cartel Marketplace, and Liberty Market force all vendors to accept both cryptocurrencies currencies.