NEW YORK—Online trading has given birth to a new platform for illegal drug sales. At a press conference Sunday, Sen. Charles Schumer called on federal authorities to shut down the online drug network called the Silk Road.

“It is hard to believe that you can go on a website and actually get the kinds of drugs that our police officers spend days, months, and years to get off the streets. But it has been revealed that is what is happening,” Schumer said.

Launched in February, Silk Road is an underground online market where sellers can list illegal drugs for sale—everything from marijuana to heroin and LSD. Its users must first download software called Tor, a hidden service protocol that masks I.P. addresses to and from the site so that users can remain anonymous.

Along with an ordinary Web address that ends with .org, the website is also based on Onion, a hidden service descriptor.

All Silk Road transactions are done using “bitcoin,” a digital peer-to-peer currency. Users purchase bitcoins from individual sellers and negotiate the price privately on Bitcoin’s official forum. As exchange of bitcoins happens without going through a bank, transactions on Silk Road are untraceable. “It is the most brazen attempt to peddle drugs online that we have ever seen,” said Schumer in reference to Silk Road.

On the market review section of Bitcoin’s forum, a post that appears to have been created by Silk Road three weeks after the market’s launch says that “drugs are an obvious direction to go in … because there isn’t a good market for them currently.”

“I have a category for weapons as well because many people are restricted from purchasing these, but no one has listed in that category yet,” commented a user named “silkroad,” in an answer to questions from another Bitcoin user. The post has attracted more than 15 pages of comments.

Entering the Web address at press time indicated that the site is temporarily closed but may reopen in July.

“This website is nothing more than an all-you-can-order buffet of narcotics that needs to be shut down immediately, and that is what we are asking the authorities to do,” Schumer said. The senator has reached out to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which, according to the senator, has confirmed that it is aware of the site. The senator is also calling on the Department of Justice (DOJ) to help shut the site down immediately.

“The bottom line is that a drug deal is a drug deal, whether online or on the streets. If we allow websites like Silk Road to continue, we will have a massive black market,” Schumer said. “We can’t let that happen, and that’s why it needs to be shut down completely.”

Silk Road: The ‘eBay’ for Narcotics

Classical Chinese Dance Competition Crowns Winners

Artist Profile: Mr. Cao Yongxin

A Murder on Tiananmen Staged to Peddle a Lie, Witness Says

The History of Gu Zheng