As another backup plan—the most-wanted man on the Internet could never have too many—Ross decided to partition the hard drive on his laptop into two different sections. (This was like cutting an earthworm in half so that it regenerated and became two new worms.) His computer essentially now became two computers with two different accounts, with one side of the machine strictly allocated to the Dread Pirate Roberts and used only for all things Silk Road. The other side of the computer was assigned to Ross and was where he would e-mail his friends and family, log in to Facebook, and flirt with girls on dating Web sites.
This was when Ross created a very strict rule, perhaps the most important of all his new security enhancements. Anything that could be linked to Ross Ulbricht online (personal e-mails or social media) would never be done on the DPR side of the computer. On the flip side, anything that linked to the Dread Pirate Roberts (logging in to the Silk Road, chatting with VJ, uploading new code to the servers) would never happen on Ross’s side of the computer. This was imperative to ensure that the two identities did not leave a trail back to each other online.
For the backup plan to the backup plan, Ross added booby traps that would activate in the highly unlikely event that someone did get into his laptop. One of the traps made the laptop go dark if someone snooped though his Web browser history more than half a dozen times.
The next part of Ross’s security operation would require ensuring that the people who worked for him were all really vigilantes fighting to legalize drugs, and not employees of the DEA or the FBI. To do this, Ross started asking people who wanted a paycheck from the Silk Road to share a picture of their ID—a driver’s license or passport, something that showed who they really were. It was a tough ask, Ross knew, but it was imperative if he didn’t want to end up in jail.
Now when he hired someone new, he went through the customary conversation, explaining that they would have no choice but to divulge who they were to the Dread Pirate Roberts.
“Do you need to see my id?” ChronicPain, a new employee, asked DPR as he prepared to join the site to help manage the user forums.
“Yes,” DPR replied. (Without a doubt.)
“Can I just tell you my name?”
“I’ll need your id with current address,” Dread wrote; then, to put ChronicPain at ease, he noted that his ID “will be stored encrypted, and I will probably never need to decrypt.”
“So,” the new employee said without much of a choice, “I guess I’ll just have to trust you on that.”
“Yea.”
Ross knew that most people would agree. Being part of the movement he was creating was more important to his employees than a slight risk. And sure enough, in a matter of hours the ID for ChronicPain arrived in DPR’s in-box.
There was also another reason to get those IDs. Ross was giving his employees more responsibility, and some even had access to Bitcoins on the site. If someone decided to cross the Dread Pirate Roberts, he would need to know who they were and where they lived. There would be retribution for such actions.
The final item on his security cleanup checklist was to create his own digital go bag that he would employ in case something catastrophic happened. If the cops knocked on his door, he needed a plan for what to do and where to go.
Ross opened a text document on his computer and created a file he called “Emergency.” He then began writing a list of things he would need to do in the event that something went terribly wrong. A doomsday list.
“Encrypt and backup important files on laptop to memory stick; destroy laptop hard drive and hide/dispose; destroy phone and hide/dispose,” Ross wrote. “Find place to live on craigslist for cash. Create new identity (name, backstory).”
But he also knew that if the day arrived when Ross and DPR did have to go into hiding, simply finding a place on Craigslist and changing his name wouldn’t be enough to protect him indefinitely. He would have to come up with a safe place to flee to. Possibly even another country. A country that embraced pirates and would take in Ross Ulbricht and the Dread Pirate Roberts and their millions of dollars in wealth and keep them both out of reach of the U.S. government.
Chapter 36
JARED’S DEAD ENDS
This is so frustrating! Jared thought.
He held on to his son Tyrus’s hand as he continued walking down the aisles of the Barnes & Noble in Lincolnshire, Illinois. They trudged up one row of books and then down another. Every few feet Tyrus, who was now three and a half, looked up at his dad as Jared searched intently for something among the stacks.
“Hello,” a chirpy woman at the information counter said to them finally. “Can I help you find something?”
“Erm,” Jared said, “I’m looking for some books on the Mises Institute.” He looked around to make sure no one had overheard what he was asking about. The last thing Jared wanted to do was get into a discussion with a random person on this topic.
“The My Says Institute?” the woman asked loudly, looking down at her computer.
“No, it’s Mises, M-I-S-E-S,” Jared whispered. “It’s a libertarian think tank that focuses on Austrian economics and . . .” He trailed off, realizing this probably made no sense to the woman in front of him. After all, this made no sense to Jared.
But still, he needed these books for the next phase of his investigation, which was starting to stall.
Since the beginning of the year, Jared had seized almost two thousand new shipments of drugs coming into the country, all by figuring out what each package would look like, and in doing so had disrupted the Silk Road as best he could. Jared had also arrested and detained a few dealers on the site, including one of the busiest, who sold ecstasy and other drugs from the Netherlands. And he had subsequently taken over some dealers’ accounts on the Silk Road, gaining a better understanding of the inner workings of the operation.
But he was still no closer to unearthing the founder of the site. So after finding himself circling around in too many online cul-de-sacs, Jared decided he would try to get inside the mind of the Dread Pirate Roberts, which was why he was standing in the Barnes & Noble in Lincolnshire, awkwardly asking about the Mises Institute.