The mastermind behind the “Silk Road” online marketplace that facilitated millions of dollars of drug sales has been given a full and unconditional pardon by US President Donald Trump.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday pardoned Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht, who was sentenced to life in prison for running an underground online marketplace where drug dealers and others conducted more than $200 million in illicit trade using bitcoin.

Ross Ulbricht was serving a life sentence for creating a site in a shady corner of the internet to sell heroin, cocaine and other illicit substances.

President Donald Trump has pardoned Ross Ulbricht, the founder of Silk Road, an underground website for selling drugs.

Libertarian activists, who generally oppose criminal drug policies, argued the government overreached in building its case against Ross Ulbricht and the dark web marketplace Silk Road.

President Trump said he granted the full pardon in honor of Ross Ulbricht's mother "and the Libertarian Movement, which supported me so strongly."

On his second day back in office, President Donald Trump issued a full pardon to Ross Ulbricht, the founder of dark-web marketplace Silk Road. Trump had pledged to free Ulbricht as part of a raft of promises made to the cryptocurrency community while on the campaign trail.

President Donald Trump pardoned Ross Ulbricht, the creator of the drug marketplace Silk Road who is revered by many cryptocurrency enthusiasts and Libertarians. “I just called the mother of Ross William Ulbright to let her know,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social, misspelling Ulbricht’s name.

The appointment brings a veteran of a major credit card network player to the company’s board at a time when cryptocurrency firms are looking to establish higher trust and credibility.

Prepare for an unforgettable evening of music and cultural celebration as the Silkroad Ensemble brings its Percussion All-Stars to George Mason’s Center for the Arts in Fairfax on Jan. 25 at 8 p.m.  The Grammy Award-winning collective,

TikTok got a short reprieve to make a deal. Project Stargate, a $500B AI plan from OpenAI, Oracle, and Softbank, pushes Musk, Microsoft, aside. Google buys HTC VR tech.