Experts: Illegal online sales of alcohol reach 2.75 bln rbl in 2021

MOSCOW, Dec 28 (PRIME) -- The turnover of Russia’s shadow online alcohol market increased by 266 million rubles in 2021 to 2.75 billion rubles, cybersecurity company Group-IB said on Tuesday in a statement.

“The Group-IB Digital Risk Protection experts discovered about 3,000 online resources – websites, channels on the messengers and groups on the social networks selling alcohol illegally,” Group-IB said.

The online floors sold smuggled products and those on sale without paying the tax. Group-IB said the perpetrators used Telegram more often than other channels with the number of channels offering sales and delivery of alcohol rising by 150% in 2021.

The number of requests “to buy alcohol with delivery” on the Yandex search engine almost doubled on the year to 108,000 in January–November.

(73.2329 rubles – U.S. $1)

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