MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 04th March, 2021) Russian IT security company Kaspersky Lab on Thursday has announced the discovery of advertisements for coronavirus vaccines in darknet marketplaces, with prices ranging from $250 to $1,200.
"Searching 15 marketplaces, Kaspersky experts found advertisements for three major COVID vaccines: Pfizer/BioNTech, AstraZeneca, and Moderna. They also found some advertisements for unverified vaccines. Prices per dose range from $250 to $1,200, averaging around $500," the company said in a statement.
According to Kaspersky Lab, sellers come mostly from France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, and use encrypted messengers for communication.
"Sellers predominantly request payments in the form of bitcoin, with rare exceptions accepting other cryptocurrencies. That makes the payments harder to track and protects the sellers' anonymity. Many of the sellers Kaspersky researchers found had conducted 100 to 500 such transactions," the company added.
Kaspersky Lab also detected fake vaccination certificates on sale, with a European vaccination record card costing approximately $20-$25, as well as forged certificates showing the one presenting such a document is not infected.
