In a FBI and global operation, the website Silk Road 2.0 has been shut down, and its leader has been arrested for running the online narcotics marketplace.

The original Silk Road site was taken down by the FBI exactly one year ago, and its alleged creator Ross Ulbricht was taken into custody.

Now, the seizure of multiple online narcotics sales sites on Thursday has Ben Benthall, Ulbricht's alleged successor with Silk Road 2.0, in handcuffs.

"As alleged, Blake Benthall attempted to resurrect Silk Road, a secret website that law enforcement seized last year, by running Silk Road 2.0, a nearly identical criminal enterprise," Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in a statement. "Let's be clear: This Silk Road, in whatever form, is the road to prison."

According to Bharara, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, Benthall was the individual behind the screen name "Defcon," an online administrator who ran Silk Road 2.0 anonymously. The website, which is no longer running, was only accessible through anonymity software Tor.

Silk Road 2.0 was reportedly selling $8 million-worth of illegal opiates, marijuana and other drugs per month with roughly 150,000 active users by September.

On the 2.0 version's launch on Nov. 6, 2013, an exact year before it was seized by the FBI, an administrator by the name of "Dread Pirate Roberts" tweeted, "You can never kill the idea of Silk Road." This screen name was allegedly the same used by original leader Ulbricht. After some early problems, like arrests of moderators and hackings that allowed for $2.6 million in Bitcoins to be stolen, Defcon took over the site in December.

"I didn't run with the gold," Defcon wrote after the Silk Road 2.0 hack in February. "I have failed you as a leader and am completely devastated by today's discoveries. ... It is a crushing blow. I cannot find the words to express how deeply I want this movement to be safe from the very threats I just watched materialize during my watch."

This sting operation is the latest attempt to corral other illegal dark marketplace websites that have emerged since Silk Road's closing. Thursday's take down included other drug marketplaces including Hydra and Cloud9, but Silk Road 2.0 was the largest site in the operation. According to DeepDotWeb, at least 18 other operations have sprouted up since last year.

The FBI spokesperson declined to comment on other marketplaces besides Silk Road 2.0 that were closed.

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