Gender Aspect: The Role and Specifics of Women's Participation in the Carding Industry (from Recruiters to Technical Specialists)

[Professor]

Abstract: The world of cybercrime, especially carding, is often perceived as an exclusively male domain — anonymous, technical, and aggressive. However, this picture is incomplete. Behind digital pseudonyms and encrypted channels, women also lurk, with unique roles and strategies for participating in the shadow economy. This article offers a perspective on the gender landscape of the carding industry without stereotypes and prejudices, as part of a complex social mosaic. We will examine how women find their place in it, how specifically feminine social skills become professional capital, and the unique risks and opportunities this hidden environment creates for them.

Introduction: Behind the avatar, gender is invisible, but significant.​

In the anonymity of the darknet, gender as a physical attribute is erased. Instead, competencies, reputation, and results take center stage. However, gender as a social construct, a set of learned behavioral patterns and available roles, continues to influence participants' trajectories. Women in carding are not just "hacker girls" from movies, but a complex social phenomenon intertwining digital literacy, economic necessity, social connections, and adaptation strategies in an informal, high-risk environment.

1. Social Architects: Recruitment and Trust Management​

One of the key and historically established niches is managing human relationships. In a world built on total mistrust, the ability to build and maintain relationships becomes a critical resource.

• Recruiter/Facilitator: Women often act as "social glue," recruiting new participants through trusted, informal networks: former classmates, friends, and acquaintances in the service industry. This trust, based on long-term personal contact, can be more effective than anonymous offers on forums.
• Drop Network Manager: Organizing a network of "drops" — people who receive goods purchased with stolen cards — requires soft skills: consistent communication, conflict resolution, motivation, and problem-solving. This administrative and logistical role fits well with stereotypically "feminine" organizational and communication skills, finding unexpected applications.
• Mediator and Dispute Resolution Agent (Mediator): On some marketplaces or in closed chats, women can act as arbitrators in conflicts. Stereotypically perceived as less aggressive and more willing to compromise, they sometimes prove more acceptable arbitrators for disputants.

Specifics: Their strength lies in social capital and emotional intelligence, which allows them to reduce transaction costs (risks of betrayal, failure to fulfill obligations) in an environment where formal contracts are impossible.

2. Tech Specialists: From Social Engineering to Data Analysis​

Contrary to stereotypes, women also occupy purely technical positions, often demonstrating high specialization.

• Social Engineering: This is a traditionally "female" specialization in the hacker community. The ability to empathize, persuade, construct plausible narratives, and manipulate the emotions of others over the phone or in text messages makes women formidable operators in this field. Their goal is not to crack a code, but to "hack" a person and obtain confidential data.
• Data Analyst/Verifier: The painstaking work of checking "dump" and "fullz" databases for validity, sorting data by banks, countries, and balances. This routine work, which requires attention to detail and a systematic approach, also attracts some participants.
• Crypto Specialist and Exchanger (Crypto Cashier): Managing cryptocurrency flows, exchanges, and laundering through decentralized finance (DeFi). Financial literacy, understanding of blockchain, and meticulousness are essential.
• Malware Developer: A rare, but not uncommon, role. Requires in-depth knowledge of programming and cybersecurity. Anonymity allows for gender biases in the legitimate IT sector to be overcome, allowing for advancement based solely on skills.

Specifics: In technical roles, women often face the need to prove their competence twice : first, overcoming mistrust ("Are you sure you know what you're doing?"), and only then, recognition. However, in successful cases, their authority becomes unquestionable.

3. Entrepreneurs and organizers of shadow businesses​

At the top of the informal hierarchy there may be women who organize entire business processes.

• Marketplace Owner and Administrator: Manages the entire infrastructure of the darknet marketplace: overseeing moderators, resolving disputes, ensuring security, and advertising. This is the equivalent of a CEO in a legitimate business.
• Purchasing-delivery-resale system organizer: Organizing the entire supply chain: acquiring card data, placing orders for high-value items, managing the drop network, logistics, and final sales. This requires strategic planning, risk management, and teamwork skills.

Specifics: Their activities are fully fledged entrepreneurship, but in a legal vacuum. They combine the traits of a crime boss and a businesswoman, building systems that operate on trust and fear.

4. Adaptation strategies and gender risks​

Participation in the industry creates specific opportunities and threats for women.

• Invisibility and Mimicry Strategy: Many prefer to remain in the shadows, avoiding public conflicts and status positions that attract the attention of law enforcement or competitors. They use the stereotypical image of "women as non-hackers" as a form of camouflage.
• Risk of double stigma: If exposed, a woman faces not only condemnation as a criminal, but also heightened moral condemnation for violating stereotypical expectations of “femininity” and “decency.”
• Vulnerability to pressure and exploitation: In hierarchical groups, women can become targets of pressure, blackmail, or attempts to shift risks onto them. Informal coalitions, reputation, and, ultimately, professional indispensability serve as protection against this.
• Motivations: economic autonomy and overcoming the "glass ceiling." For some, this is a path to rapid financial success and independence in an environment where legitimate career paths in IT or business can be blocked by discrimination or a lack of opportunity.

5. Gender image as a tool in social engineering​

The female gender image becomes a conscious tool in the arsenal of social engineering.

• The "damsel in distress" scam is used to extort money or information from targeted victims (often men) through connections on social media or dating sites.
• The role of a "bank security officer" is used to obtain confidential information over the phone. A female voice may be associated with less threat and greater trust.
• This is the professional use of gender stereotypes for manipulation, where gender becomes part of the working toolkit.

Conclusion: A Complex Mosaic in the Shadows​

Women's participation in the carding industry dispels the myth of its exclusively male nature. They aren't simply present — they occupy specific, often critically important niches where social and emotional intelligence, organizational skills, and attention to detail are valued just as much, and sometimes even more, than brute technical prowess.

This phenomenon is a twisted mirror of gender dynamics in the legal economy: women find alternative routes to income and influence where traditional paths are difficult, but they often reproduce and exploit existing stereotypes for their own ends.

Exploring this aspect allows us to see the carding industry not as a monolithic structure, but as a complex ecosystem where a wide variety of human strategies for survival, adaptation, and self-realization intertwine. Understanding this diversity is key to a more nuanced and effective approach to both prevention and the overall perception of this phenomenon. It is a reminder that in the digital shadows, as in the sunlight, the full diversity of human nature is present.