Silk Road operated as a Tor hidden service and has been criticized.
 From this revelation, monks were sent by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian (ruled 527565) as spies on the Silk Road from Constantinople to China and back to steal the silkworm eggs, resulting in silk production in the Mediterranean, particularly in Thrace in northern Greece, and giving the Byzantine Empire a monopoly on silk production in medieval Europe
Despite repeatedly surviving many geopolitical changes and disruptions, the Silk Road abruptly lost its importance with the rise of the Ottoman Empire in 1453, which almost immediately severed trade between East and West

