--- title: 'Russia''s Shadow Forums in 2025: Banned Content, Killers, and Kittens' source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=n7UjFF0AshQ' video_id: 'n7UjFF0AshQ' date: 2026-07-31 duration_sec: 841 --- # Russia's Shadow Forums in 2025: Banned Content, Killers, and Kittens > Source: [Russia's Shadow Forums in 2025: Banned Content, Killers, and Kittens](https://youtube.com/watch?v=n7UjFF0AshQ) ## Summary The video traces the history of Russian-speaking cybercrime forums, from their origins in the 1990s to the modern darknet era. It covers the rise of carding sites, the role of guarantors, the impact of Silk Road and Bitcoin, and the influence of Roskomnadzor crackdowns. ### Key Points - **Origins of shadow forums** [00:02] — In the 90s and 2000s, shadow forums emerged as places for techies to exchange hacking instructions, virus creation, and personal data theft methods. - **Specialization in the 2000s** [00:32] — Markets and forums began offering diverse cybercrime goods and services, including exploits, DDoS attacks, and personal data trading. - **First CIS carder forum** [01:26] — The first carder forum in the CIS was 'Karprg', where users could make purchases with stolen American credit cards; all forums had fewer than 6,000 registered users back then. - **Rise of the Carder site** [02:35] — The Carder forum, founded by Dmitry Golubov (Script) and Vladislav Kharakhorin, was structured like the Italian mafia and became the largest carding platform. - **Dumps and stolen accounts** [03:49] — Users could buy stolen ICQ accounts and physical dumps (blank white cards); hacker Boa ran the dump department and later sold dumps with matching fake documents. - **Sergey Pavlovich's empire** [05:10] — Pavlovich sold complete sets (dump + documents) on the 'Market' website for $1,000 after buying them for €150, earning over $100,000 per month; he later served 10 years in prison. - **Underground services in 2008** [06:08] — Forum 'This.org' offered license plate lookups, forged documents, judge IDs for 18,000 rubles, and journalist credentials for 3,500 rubles. - **Cypherpunks and drug forums** [08:28] — Starting in 2009, anarchist hackers calling themselves cypherpunks created anonymous forums focused on psychoactive substances, leading to private sales via encrypted channels. - **2011: XenForo and Silk Road** [09:14] — XenForo forum software was released; Silk Road launched in February 2011, used Bitcoin, amassed over $1 billion in turnover, and was shut down in October 2013. - **Russian darknet and guarantors** [11:24] — After Silk Road, Russian forums like PH and Rutor grew; guarantors act as escrow agents, and trust in them is crucial for transactions. - **Roskomnadzor crackdowns** [13:03] — Since 2019, Roskomnadzor has actively banned shadow platforms, forcing many to move to Telegram or create mirrors; without these measures, there would be many more services. ### Conclusion The video shows how Russian shadow forums evolved from small tech hangouts into sophisticated darknet markets, shaped by trust systems, technological shifts, and state regulation. ## Transcript began to form back in the distant nineties and noughties. This was a period of active development of the Internet in the world and in Russia in particular. At that time, many technologies and knowledge were not yet widely available and, in principle, publicly accessible, but shadow forums became a place for the exchange of experience between techies of the time and a place where one could find, for example, instructions on hacking a website, creating viruses, stealing personal data, and so on. During the 2000s, there was a rapid development and specialization of shadow internet forums. Markets and forums have begun to offer an increasingly diverse range of goods and services related to cybercrime. Carding developed especially actively. By the way, we have a great video on our channel about carding, how people steal money, and all that jazz. So after watching this video, be sure to check it out. It's in the description, somewhere around short, this is, simply put, the sale of credit card information by Ukraine. Special platforms also emerged for selling exploits, organizing DodoOS attacks, as well as trading personal data and all sorts of total illegality, which was even lower. This period was also characterized by the formation of large hacker groups, which also dealt with whatever came to hand. And some of them have gained quite a bit of notoriety thanks to high-profile attacks and leaks. The first forum for carders in the CIS was Karprg. At that time, the Internet was just beginning to develop, and sufficiently advanced users from the CIS countries could, in a short period of time, make a purchase with the card of some Mr. Jones from America, apparently without his knowledge. And, of course, the number of such people kept growing. And usually at that moment they would place orders or purchase goods abroad, so as not to, for obvious reasons, further irritate law enforcement agencies in the CIS countries. At that time, no more than 6,000 people were registered on all forums. Now you can find information for comparison on the Cardiology forums, of which there are currently, just a second, about 30. The total number of accounts here ranges from half a million to a million. Obviously, no one can give you 100% data. Of these, there are probably around 100,000-150,000 active users probably around 100,000-150,000 active users lot. By the way, our Telegram does n't have 150,000 active members, but it already has 22,000. Be sure to visit our Telegram channel and look for the post under the hashtag Navigator. There we collected and importantly tested a bunch of methods for working and earning money. So the first link is in the description. Welcome. After Cardi, Carder appeared and became the largest carding site at that time. The carder's founding fathers were Dmitry Golubov, nicknamed Script, and Vladislav Kharakhorin. This is VTB. The Planet car had a hierarchy based on the Italian mafia. On the website, you could find information that would now be demanded for money, and then scammed, which was completely freely available. Well, we'll talk about guarantors a little further in the video, so you can more easily understand what kind of era it was when all this was basically born. In 1999, there was even a magazine called Hacker published in Russia, most of whose issues covered karting in great detail, literally from A to Z. Of course, it didn't have a full manual, like how to make payments and so on, but for a casual magazine, the information was more than adequate for the time. It wasn't even considered something criminal, but rather noble. After all, we are not stealing from ourselves, but from the Americans abroad. In addition, the site offered the opportunity to purchase stolen accounts, such as ICQ accounts. It was also possible to buy dumps. This is, to put it simply, real white plastic. It looks something like this. You buy a blank white card or rewrite it with a special device. That's all. But there was a problem. You never knew how much money was on the card. But still, since there are a lot of cards, let's be honest, there not perceived as a problem. A hacker nicknamed Boa, who headed the dump department on Planet, later opened his own website where you could buy the same dumps, as well as fake documents to go with them, so that the fake documents to go with them, so that the cardholder's name and yours matched. And, in fact, it would be easier for you to make a purchase in some random store later . Well, here it all ended rather badly. The bottle of justice arrived very quickly. He stayed there longer than almost all of his fellow hackers. He will spend 17 years in an American prison. And recently he came out and gave a plan. It existed for about 2-3 years, somewhere until 2004. And after intense attention from the American media and law enforcement, they were forced to shut down their platform. There are plans in the ruins, as is usually the case, because holy places are empty. New forums for hacker movements have emerged. In the USA, they mainly used the American Shepherd, which was also subsequently closed. There was also a Market website. It was created by a carder, better known to all of us as Sergei Pavlovich, who now runs his own YouTube channel called People Prop. Pavlovich was one of the first carders in the CIS and is currently one of the most popular and well-known. He sold his dumps on the Market website, and also on Fy. It was a complete set, card plus documents. To give you an idea of ​​the scale, he himself paid about 150 euros for this set , and sold it for 1,000. There was no end to the number of clients, and he was earning more than $100,000 a month. Obviously, this is all according to his words. Be that as it may, in reality, judging by his current activities, he has gone into script work. But even if there was half as much, this, I remind you, was in the 2000s, this is simply a gigantic amount of money. Subsequently, according to the story of his predecessor, Sergei served 10 years in prison. As early as 2008, forums offering slightly illegal services began to slowly emerge. This.org. One of the first underground internet forums dedicated to automotive topics, offering a wide range of services, from, for example, obtaining information by license plate number to document forgery, including special service IDs and special accessories for your car. These are sirens, strobe lights and all sorts of other stuff that can help you on the road. In addition, the site offered other dubious services, including hacking emails and purchasing driver's licenses. This level of activity is impressive, especially considering this was in 2008. At the time, I was just learning how to install the client to play Linage 2. But this kind of activity was already emerging on the internet . Example: for just 18,000 you could get a judge's ID card for 5 years. To all this we add license plates for the car. This service was indeed sold. In fact, it's not a State Court, if you Google it. The crust, and, accordingly, the mandate of a Rete judge does not have the same privilege as a state judge. That is, in fact, it was a kind of show-off or an option to solve one’s problems in the easiest way. Don't forget what time all this happened. Even 2008 was like the 1990s, with businesses being taken over and all sorts of lawlessness, and then, bam, you have a chicken judge, and the license plates are as they should be . And this, by the way, could solve a lot of problems. Obviously, from those who don’t know that all of this is, in fact, fake. Journalist credentials also come into play . Well, there are such special media outlets created for the sale of such a thing as a freelance journalist. It cost pennies, about 3,500 rubles. at the time of the eighteenth year. Well, thanks to this certificate, one could get a pass, for example, to Igromir, to the same FIFA. People passed, there were cases and, in fact, to recoup the cost of this very crust. So what do we have in the end? We have a website that actually has no visitors, well, nothing really. It's clear that you won't be able to attend any serious government events with such media. But still. In Russia, starting in 2009, a group of anarchist hackers who called themselves cypherpunks became increasingly active. These tech- savvy loners created a network of anonymous internet forums where psychoactive substances became one of the main topics. Participants in these forums openly discussed their experiences with psychoactive substances and, in fact, shared information, which ultimately led to the organization of private sales transactions through encrypted communication channels. 2010. As the years go by, cybercrime in Russia and the world in particular have begun to adopt laws aimed at combating this phenomenon. This has affected the work of shadow forums. Many of them have been shut down or moved to more secure areas of the darknet. 2011. I would call 2011 one of the most important years for the dark web. Firstly, a software package for Internet forums is being released. This is kenfora. And, by the way, most of the shadow forums still operate on it. Next is the creation of the legendary force code. The Silk Road was the first and most famous of the marketplaces used to sell various goods. Including most of them were illegal. Unfortunately, I can’t say such black stuff on YouTube in 2025, but I Roskomnadzor officers who can Roskomnadzor anyone they want. Various injuries and flour. I think you understand what we were talking about. It was launched in February 2011. The primary currency for the rape transaction was Bitcoin, which ensured the anonymity of buyers and sellers. Well, as was believed at the time, from its launch until its closure in October 2013, KRO attracted a large number of users and contributed to the popularization of Bitcoin as a means for anonymous transactions. Online estimates indicate that the platform's turnover over the course of its existence has amounted to more than $1 billion. The FPR shut down the site in October 2013, and Roslbrecht was arrested in February 2015. He was found guilty on multiple charges, including drug trafficking, conspiracy to commit computer hacking, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. In May 1915, Ulbrecht was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. The closure of KROT has had a significant impact on the Darknet and cryptocurrencies. First, it brought the existence of Darknet marketplaces to the attention of the general public and law enforcement agencies . And the main thing is the possibility of anonymous transactions via Bitcoin. Secondly, after the closure of the prorod, many other platforms emerged to try to take its place, which led to increased competition among illegal marketplaces and increased difficulties for law enforcement. And, obviously, this has a significant impact not only on the global Darknet, but also on the development of the shadow internet in Russia. In Russia, as in many other countries, following the closure of Skrot, there has been a rise in interest in the Darknet and anonymous online markets. In particular, this includes the PH forum, Konental, and the same Rutor. Almost all forums of those years were designed for essentially the same thing, but the difference was huge in terms of work and transaction security. So, on one well-known forum, known to absolutely everyone involved in shadow activities, a deal was conducted in guarantor. What happened? A guarantor is a third party who acts as a bank at the time of the transaction and resolves all issues regarding the return of funds if the transaction is not completed properly. Basically, the guarantor simply cheated us out of the amount that was given to him as a deposit for the goods. I don't think there's any point in telling you what the product is . The only important message here is that the guarantor is one of the most important links in the entire structure. And with the loss of trust in the guarantor, as you understand, new transactions will appear extremely, extremely rarely. This is precisely why it is important to choose the right guarantors and services to work with. But we are not united by any black stuff, friends. Here you can also find so-called smoking rooms and threads where you can find information ranging from news on the darknet and the shadow world in general, about someone being detained, something new happening, to articles on jurisprudence, which personally surprised me. And here, perhaps, is some advice from the Dark Archive. If you're going to work, work with the right guarantors, not those who cheat their audience for 2 kopecks. This is crucial for all forums. Starting in 2019, perhaps, very difficult times have arrived, as Roskomnadzor began actively banning all platforms of this nature, and many of them either exited CC, which is quite normal, or began creating mirrors to keep the resource accessible. In general, Roskomnadzor only seems like something funny and that it doesn’t concern us. But believe me, if it weren’t for their work, there would be many more services. Time flies and sites develop. Nowadays, you can easily find information about anything you can think of, even if it costs money. And forums like these are exactly what help with this. Well, I hope this video was helpful for you. Be sure to like and subscribe to the channel. Also, don't forget about the post under the hashtag Navigator. There will be more information for you there. First more information for you there. First link in the description. Take care of yourself. Bye.