Market tutorial for The Trade Route market, as it was provided by the market staff:
1. Security
First of all we have to be sure that we are completely anonymous while using Trade Route.
VPN
This step is not mandatory but it’s highly recommended in order to protect your privacy. The reason for using a VPN is that you need to hidden your IP, even though you’re already going to use Tor to protect your anonymity it never hurts to have a second layer of security.
At this link you have a very good comparison chart for different VPN services. Just choose one, download and install.
As you can see there are no free services in the list, this is the price of your safety. There are some free VPN services but be aware that they can be worse than not using a VPN.
Tor Browser
You need Tor in order to visit “.onion” web pages like TradeRoute. So please go to the official page and download the Tor browser . There are manuals for installation on the download page for OS X, Windows, and Linux.
Now using Tor Browser + VPN you can feel protected but let´s add more security.
PGP
Comunication in the deep web should be encryted to prevent third parties from reading your info, for example your address when you want to make an order. There are three excellent PGP guides on DeepDotWeb for each OS:
Linux: Linux guide
OS X: Mac guide
Windows: Windows guide
BTC
Bitcoin (BTC) is the currency that’s currently accepted on TradeRoute. This cryptocurrency allows you to make anonymous payments, unlike FIAT money where every digital payment leaves a trail.
You only need to change some of your FIAT money to BTC. You can use lot of services to get your Bitcoins such as Localbitcoins, exchanges like Bitstamp or Bitfinex, look for BTC ATM’s in your city, etc.
The most simple could be Localbitcoins as you dont need to give lot of info and there are lots of payment methods. For using this way:
Step 1. Create an account at Localbitcoins
Step 2. Choose one of the buying bitcoins option
Step 3. Make the deal and you will have bitcoins on your localbitcoins account to transfer when you need.
2. Market
Payment systems
There are 3 different payment methods on Trade Route which we are going to explain shortly:
Multisignature
Multisignature is the crown jewel of Bitcoin transactions. It works like this, on every order we create a multisignature wallet where we store the funds until the order is finalized by the customer. This payment method is always priorized over escrow, so if the vendor has multisignature configured on his account the transaction will be processed using multisig and perfectly safe.
There are two possible scenarios when using multisig:
If the vendor and the customer both have multisignature configured in their account the sale will be done using a 2 of 3 multisignature transaction. This means that there exist 3 keys that are owned by the market, the vendor and the customer. At least 2 of those 3 keys are needed in order to move the funds. This is the best option as it is completely flawless, the funds are kept safe all the time.
In cases that only the vendor has configured multisignature the sale will be processed using a 2 of 2 multisignature transaction. This way there are 2 keys that are owned by the market and the vendor and both are needed in order to transfer the funds. Although not as safe as the first option, this is much more secure than traditional escrow because the funds are not stored in the market’s wallets which are susceptible to attacks.
You will see a 20 days timer by default which automatically releases the funds if you don’t finalize or extend the due date. This was placed because sometimes buyers forget to release the funds. This timer can be restarted by the buyer before the due date in case the item is still not received to avoid losing the order guarantees.
Escrow
TradeRoute uses an escrow system as a fallback when it’s not possible to use multisignature. Escrow is a very comfortable payment system because neither the vendor or the customer have to configure anything in their accounts in order to use it. Just place an order, send your coins to the market and wait for your goods. The funds will be sent to the vendor once you finalize the order.
*Please beware of the dangers that this payment system poses as your money is held for a long time in the market wallets and may be susceptible to scams or hacks. We highly recommend using multisignature. We only kept this payment system as a last option for vendors who refuse to use multisignature transactions.
Of course 20 days timer works as in the Multisignature sales.
FE
Finalize early means that money is obtained by the vendor in the moment he marks the order as shipped. This is the most risky payment option and for this reason FE permissions can only given by the admins to trusted vendors and you should only buy from them if you really trust them. All of us know who they are, thousand of sales, years in the business, good feedback, etc.
Use this payment method at your own risk as the market cannot guarantee any refunds.
Buyers
How to create an account?
Get the link to TradeRoute from here and go onto the site, once there, complete all the fields required. Please note that we have disabled the 10,000 most popular passwords and PIN’s like “123456”, “qwerty”, “123abc” or “baseball” in order to keep you account safer.
In the “Display currency” dropdown you have to choose in which currency do you want to see the product prices, you can change it anytime under the “Account settings” tab.
Push “Register” button and you will read “Success! Please log in.”, now you are ready to start.
Configure account
Click on “Account” tab which is in the menu at the right side of the logo. Four new tabs will be shown: “Deposit/Withdrawal”, “Account settings”, “Edit profile”, “Become a vendor”
Edit profile:
You can add a description of yourself in the first box and add your PGP public key in the second one.
It is highly recommended to configure a PGP key because it will make your account much more secure by allowing other users to contact you using automatic encryption and gives you the possibility of activating 2-FA on your account.
Account settings: Here you can manage your password, PIN, display currency, 2-FA and multisig key.
It is strongly advised to enable 2-FA on your account. 2-FA will ask you to decrypt a short message every time you login thus greatly increasing your account’s security. An attacker would need to steal both your password and your PGP private key in order to take control of your account. This is very hard to do as the PGP key is safely stored on your computer.
Remember that it’s very important that you don’t lose your PGP private key and password after activating two factor authentication.
Multisignature:
We at TradeRoute encourage people to use multisignature transactions when buying on our market. You can do so by configuring your account in two easy steps.
Step 1. Paste your Bitcoin wallet address (not the market one), it should be the one that you use to hold your Bitcoins or a newly created one outside the market. Be sure that you’ll have access to it because in case the vendor cancels the order or if you receive a refund the funds will automatically go to the auto-withdrawal address.
Step 2. Generate a multisignature public key and paste it in the second field. Please don’t be afraid of this process as you can do it with almost any Bitcoin client and there are very easy guides out there.
Here you can find a great tutorial that will guide you through the process of creating the public key using one of the most popular bitcoin clients.
After completing the two fields just save this info by pressing the “ACTIVATE” button and you’ll be ready to go. Please store the multisig public and private keys that you just generated, you’ll need them to be able to move the funds in case the market goes down or something.
Referral profit system: Share your referral link and earn 10% of the commissions generated by every user that registers using your link.
Deposit/Withdrawal: Here you can add or withdraw BTC from your market account. Remember that the deposit address can only be used once, after one use it will change automatically.
NOTE: Is not mandatory to deposit money in the market to buy your goods. You will see why we say this in the buying proccess.
Buying proccess
Let´s clarify some points before starting.
-In the ads you will see one of these two symbols:
Secure payment option (Multisig or escrow)
FE
-You may find the feedback score next to the name of every user. The score may go from 0 to 100. Everyone begins with a base score of 50 and can climb up towards 100 if they behave nice or down to 0 which would mean the user is a total scamer. Please keep in mind that the score is not shown until the user completes at least 3 orders.
Now is time to buy something.
Step 1. Choose an item that you want, click on the ad and you will go to this page:
1: Number of item you want to buy
2: Select shipment method
3: Click to go payment page
4: Here you can see feedback left for other customers of this item.
Step 2. Complete the fields and press “BUY” button.
Step 3. Write your address and your PIN. Is highly recommended to encrypt your address using seller PGP public key, if you don´t encrypt system will do automatically. Place the order
Step 4. Now you have two options:
If you had enough funds in your market account to make the purchase it will be taken from this account.
If you didn´t have enough funds, you will see a page like this:
You have 3 hours to send the money to the payment address shown on the green box . If you send the money too late, the order will be autocancelled and the funds will be deposited in your market account.
You can follow all your orders in the Orders Tab.
When order has been shipped you will see:
1: This is the timer for orders which run into Multisig or Escrow. Remember you can restart it.
2: Order reference.
3: Click on Finalize when order is received or Dispute if you have problems.
Vendors
First of all you need to follow the buyer steps “Create Buyer account” and “Configure account”.
For upgrading to a vendor account there are two requeriments:
Add PGP public key before.
Haven´t done any purchase with this account (for safety reasons).
Upgrade to vendor account
Go to Account>>Become a vendor.
Under this tab you will see a button to upgrade your account to vendor status, the button will be only available if you meet all the requirements, that is enough balance for the vendor bond and a valid PGP key. The vendor bond are 100 USD right now and it will be returned to you after completing 100 succesful sales.
Configure vendor account
Now in “Account” you will see two new tabs:
Vendor Settings:
Here you can see your statistics, change your status to vacation mode, shipping info, create discount coupons and generate automatic messages.
By clicking in NEW DISCOUNT COUPON button you will see a page like this one:
Just complete the fields like in the image and press the button to create a new coupon.
Sharing the Coupon code with your customers is the only way they can use it.
Automatic messages can be triggered on events related with orders. For example you could set an auto-message to be sent to your customer when he marks an order as received, and you could even include a discount code to be used in the next 10 days.
Manage listings
Before creating your first listings you have to configure some shipment options using the following form.
After creating at least one shipment method you may continue by clicking on the “NEW LISTING” button to create an advertisement. Just complete all the fields required. In the Shipping methods you have the list that you created before, check all the options you want to include in the ad.
As you can see FE is not available. You need to speak with admins before you are able to use it. It is reserved for trusted vendors only.
*Please don’t forget to configure your listing accordingly to your needs, you can create stealth and public listings. If you choose the stealth option the listing won’t be visible to the public but only to the people you share the listing link with. Also please remember to check the “Active” option as otherwise the listing won’t be available on the market.
Click on save and your listing is up and running!
The Trade Route – DeepDotWeb Listing & Review page
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