PIXXTASY – The NFT Project Battling Drug Addiction

PIXXTASY uses the power of NFTs and blockchain technology to fight against drug addiction and help people recover. Read more

Overwhelming amount of social posts in Hong Kong use NFTs to promote drug ad campaigns

The number of social media posts about drugs on Hong Kong’s internet has tripled in six years, where hashtags, animation characters, and NFTs are often used to promote ad campaigns about drugs, according to a survey of Hong Kong Federation of Youth Groups’ Youth Crime Prevention Center. Read more

Widespread use of crypto, Telegram leads to surge in teen drug crimes in Korea

This summer, South Korean police busted an online drug cartel circulating methamphetamine and MDMA via an encrypted messaging app. The mastermind, as it turned out, was no Pablo Escobar but an 18-year old looking to earn some extra spending cash. Read more

Tech is Changing the Way People Score and Sell Drugs in India

According to data from the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) of India, there are 100 million drug users in the country, with consumption rising 70 percent in the last eight years. In Bengaluru alone, there has been a nearly 10-fold increase in cases over the last three years, with India’s Silicon Valley registering the highest number of cases related to narcotics in the country in 2020. News reports and online forums refer to people’s phones being snatched, with cops searching their chat and photo applications for keywords like “score,” “ganja” and “pot”. Read more

Telegram Becoming Drug Dealing Marketplace of Choice in Argentina

The use of Telegram as a sales and communication platform for drugs has spread across Argentina, and Telegram-enabled crimes have increased by 350% in the last two years. Read more

Darkweb markets compete for drug trafficking and illegal pharmacy monopoly

Major drug markets in the Dark Web are now worth around $315 million annually according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Resecurity estimates this figure to be significantly higher in 2023, the annual sales of illegal drugs in the Dark Web for 2022 exceeded $470 million – which is the result of increased geopolitical tensions, global pandemics, and unprecedented growth of shadow economy internationally. Read more

Recommendations for setting up online harm reduction services

The Eurasian Harm Reduction Association (EHRA) presents a brief guide with recommendations on how to launch a new – or improve an existing – online harm reduction service for people who use drugs. Read more

EHRA published the manual on online counseling

Eurasian Harm Reduction Association (EHRA) published the Peer-to-Peer Counselor Manual for Online Counseling. Read more

Inside Castle Craig – the rehab centre helping cryptocurrency addicts

Castle Craig is a rehab centre in Scotland that deals with all kinds of addictions, as well as grief issues, unresolved trauma, eating disorders and self harm. Over the past six years, it has seen more than 100 people with dangerous cryptocurrency problems. Read more

Chatbots battle COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy

Researchers at Johns Hopkins had already been developing chatbots to combat vaccine misinformation when the coronavirus pandemic arrived, giving their work greater urgency. Read more