bidding for extinction

The Internet has become the world’s biggest marketplace, one that is open for business 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and which grows bigger by the day. It is as unregulated and anonymous as it is immense, providing easy opportunities for criminal activity and transactions. Increasingly it is the means by which the illicit trade in wildlife is conducted—a trade so great that it is now estimated to be second only to illegal trafficking in drugs and weapons.