American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road

Bitcoin (BTC) is an online digital currency, or cryptocurrency, that exists outside of government control. It can be exchanged for paper money, and anyone with internet access can buy and trade it as long as they have a digital wallet application. Bitcoin transactions are recorded via blockchain, a public list that groups the verified transactions into a “block.” Specialized computers with Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) solve puzzles in a process known as mining to validate Bitcoin transactions and keep everything secure. There are only 21 million Bitcoins, and this scarcity has drastically driven up the price since its creation in 2008. Bitcoin’s official creator is unknown, since the only name attached to it is the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, which may have referred to more than one person. This cryptocurrency allowed Ross to create cashless transactions for the Silk Road marketplace, and since Bitcoin is not as traceable as traditional forms of money, it helped make transactions more private and more secure.

The deconfliction meeting was a high-stakes session convened by the Department of Justice to coordinate the fractious and overlapping investigations into the Silk Road. The gathering exposed the deep-seated turf wars among the various agencies hunting Ross.