After three weeks of intermittent availability and months of reports of withdrawals being halted, the long-standing Vice City darknet marketplace was declared by a Dread moderator yesterday to be “most likely” undergoing an exit scam, despite it remaining online at present.
Vice City had been plagued by a number of problems for several months, slowly losing the confidence of its users due to extended periods of downtime, problems processing withdrawals as well as deposits, and an overall lack of communication from market staff and admins. The market was removed from trusted darknet link provider tor.taxi sometime during the last two to three weeks, lending credence to the sentiment that something with it was amiss.
In a one-sentence post by Dread moderator Solar under the title “Do Not Use ViceCity Market At This Time”, the market’s unfavorable situation seemed to be confirmed, putting to rest what many of its users had feared for at least the last few weeks. “Markets (sic) is most likely exit scamming,” wrote Solar, without providing any additional context or information.
Vice City appeared to be fully operational as of Fri, Jun 9, with no mention of problems and despite numerous reports it had stopped processing withdrawals.
The official Vice City account on Dread posted for the last time on Apr 19, 2023. Although the account had never been particularly active, it had not bothered to address any concerns of users or multiple speculations of its demise. Rumors that an exit scam was underway had been circulating since at least Dec 2022, although the market always returned after prolonged period of going offline to prove naysayers wrong.
The general consensus on Dread currently appears to be that the exit scam was a long time in the making, and recent posts in the Vice City subdread reflect an array of problems with the market, from withdrawal requests not being processed to login issues to lack of support regarding tickets and disputes.
Vice City was launched in May 2020 and has been the subject of much controversy during the course of its three years in operation. In addition to the problems mentioned above – many of which plagued it through its lifetime – basic functionalities of the market were often under disrepair, leading some to question its trustworthiness. Despite its troubles, Vice City also achieved a good deal of popularity thanks to its relatively large selection of listings and Direct Pay (per-order) payment system.
