Short answer: Escrow is a hold on payment until a condition is met. On a market it usually means the platform holds coins, not a court. That protects you from a vendor only while the platform itself stays honest and online.
This is a catalog explainer, not a shopping walkthrough. TorBible does not publish shop onions we did not already hold, and we do not tell you how to place an order.
Three designs you will see in public write-ups
| Design | Who can release funds | Typical claim | Typical failure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional escrow | The market operators | Fast disputes | Exit scam or seizure drains the pot |
| Multisig (often 2-of-3) | Buyer, vendor, and a third key | Operators cannot walk away alone | Complex UX; few 2026 shops run it at scale |
| Finalize early (FE) | Buyer releases before delivery | Faster for trusted vendors | No remaining hold if the parcel never arrives |
Public directories still list traditional escrow on most English-language names we track. Multisig is the exception, not the default. White House Market (retired 2021) is the usual historical example of a shop that treated multisig as normal and later wound down without an exit.
What “dispute” actually decides
A dispute is an internal ticket, not a legal process. Moderators look at whatever evidence the shop’s rules allow — tracking text, PGP mail, photos. Speed varies. Nexus is often described as fast; that is a community reputation claim, not a measurement we run.
If the operators disappear, the ticket queue disappears with them. Escrow does not survive an exit scam.
Finalize early is a privilege, not a feature
FE means the buyer marks the order complete before they can verify the goods. Public reviews of Torzon and DrugHub say FE is limited to high-tier vendors. That reduces some vendor risk for the platform. It increases buyer risk. Treat FE as “the hold is already gone.”
How to read our tags
When a TorBible card shows Escrow, it means our file records that the name is described as using an escrow hold. It is not a guarantee that coins are safe, that disputes are fair, or that the shop will exist next month. Pair the tag with OPSEC and phishing detection — and never treat a directory as a wallet.
See also: multisig, exit scam, crypto privacy.