I thought it would be beneficial to everyone if we itemized and amalgamated the OPSEC mistakes that are now causing us to peer out our windows like blitzed crackheads. I'll start things off:
- I used the same username and password on Alphabay and Hansa
- I ignored all the "technical issues" threads on here about Hansa and jumped like a lemming.
- I sent coins directly from an exchange to Hansa because I trusted the whole "Naw dude it's cool we generate new wallets for every transaction" shtick. Never did that on AB but Hansa kind of forced your hand with the 15 minute timer. This is probably my worst mistake and why I'm personally nervous since my name was on that exchange account.
- I bought some pills the day before the bottom dropped out of Hansa. The PGP key did not have an email attached, only a name. And the name was just the username of the vendor account. In all my dozens of order, that has only been the case maybe twice. I'm very nervous this was a modified PGP key.
- I stopped connecting to tor through a VPN. For all but the last few months (fuck me, right?) I'd had always on VPN on all my computers. Then my provider started having issues and I just said "Ehh screw it". Not making that mistake again with all the suspicious relay behaviour as of late.
- I didn't use tails. However, I'm not that worried about this one since I have full disk encryption on all my computers and they're GNU/Linux.
In the spirit of education and discussion, here is what I've done since the shit hit the fan:
- Deleted all GPG data.
- I nuked my old reddit account using shreddit.
- I nuked my exchange account.
- I nuked any password in my tracker related to anything even tangential to these activities. The tracker is local and PGP encrypted for the record, none of that fucking Google or Lastpass crap.
- I removed any traces of any tor software from my computers.
- All clearweb history/cache/everything is nuked and has been entirely disabled for the foreseeable future.
- THE FUCKING VPN IS BACK ON ALWAYS.
- All substances and related sundries went to Belize. (i.e. I didn't burn them but they are far away from my abode, and will stay away for a couple months.)
- Thorough house clean including surface wipe downs.
Any criticism of my own personal actions are very welcome. And like I said please share any other advice or grievances you all have. This is a game of cat and mouse and we have to have each other's backs if we're to reclaim the upper hand.
inb4 all the "burn house, move to belize" comments
On another note, im sure you will be fine. Like a lot of people have already said, if they are after anyone its vendors and big buyers as big buyers are usually vendors/dealers. Learn from your mistakes. People freaked out when this happened to SR1, SR2, Sheep etc etc and 99% of people were fine. There is probably thousands of people in the same boat as you right now. All the best brother