The promise of the internet making the world a better place didn’t exactly pan out. In some cases, it only made it easier to do the bad things people were already doing.
That includes trafficking wildlife, as a new review in Nature Reviews Biodiversity found that online spaces like Facebook, eBay, and TikTok have become major marketplaces for illegally selling wild animals.
Researchers led by University of Helsinki professor Enrico Di Minin combed through online platforms where people typically buy and sell stuff and found thousands of examples of animals, plants, and fungal species being offered illegally.
In just six weeks, in a review of 280 platforms conducted in mid-2025, the researchers identified 33,006 specimens involving species protected or considered vulnerable under CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
Facebook, eBay and TikTok Have Become Major Hubs for Illegal Wildlife Sales
This includes live animals sold as exotic pets and wildlife killed for body parts. The types of animals involved run the gamut, from primates to birds, snakes, frogs, fish, and, as I covered recently, even rare orchids.
Some of the species were under threat of extinction: others haven’t even been fully recognized and studied by researchers before they hit the black market, the wheels of which have been greased by the frictionless ease of the Internet, wherein sellers can hide behind anonymous accounts and reach international buyers without much effort, and with shockingly little resistance from big companies like meta and eBay definitely have the funds to better police their markets.
Trafficking wild animals isn’t just bad for the animals themselves, but for the ecosystems they both leave and now inhabit. Ecosystems are delicate, and the decline of any species can throw off that balance, causing ecological chaos.
Introducing wildlife to a whole new ecosystem can create an invasive species that eats food meant for local species and can bring new diseases.
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