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Last month, Ross Ulbrichtthe alleged Silk Road mastermind who is facing trial in November for multiple drug and ID fraud chargesfiled a motion arguing that his Fourth Amendment rights had been violated in the governments seizure of the Silk Road servers and subsequent searches. In response, the prosecution has revealed for the first time how the government was able to uncover and seize the servers of the online drug bazaar.

Ever since the servers were seized in October 2013, the take down of the Silk Road remained a shadowy government secret. Now, the feds have shed some light on their actions in a 59-page rebuttal and 10-page letter letter from former FBI agent Christopher Tarbell filed on Friday.

According to the rebuttal, the downfall of the Silk Road was as simple as some leaky code. The server was located by the FBI New York Field Office in June 2013, when FBI agents noticed the servers Internet protocol (IP) address leaking in traffic sent from the Silk Road website when FBI agents interacted with it. After examining the leaking IP addresses, the FBI says it found IP addresses that were not associated with the Tor network. When those IP addresses were entered into a non-Tor web browser, a partial Silk Road login screen appeared, which the FBI saw as confirmation that the IP addressed belonged to the Silk Road server.

The FBIs next step was to contact authorities in Iceland, where the servers were located and ask for routing information and images of the server contents. The Reykjavik Metropolitan Police sent the FBI routing information, which revealed a high volume of Tor traffic flowing to the server. The RMP then sent the FBI server images containing databases of vendor postings, transaction records, private messages between users, and other data reflecting user activity, which confirmed that the servers were hosting the Silk Road. Additionally, computer code from the servers in Iceland led the feds to a Silk Road server backup at a data center in Pennsylvania. After obtaining warrants, the FBI searched those databases twice before seizing the servers in October.

In the scenario described by the FBI, the takedown of the Silk Road happened not because of a Tor software failure but because of a failure to properly secure the website, according to Forbes contributor and Tor expert Runa Sandvik. To have a secure Tor service, one needs to ensure that the code is secure, that the web server only accepts connections from Tor, and that the server does not reveal its real IP address. The vulnerability through which the FBI says it discovered the servers is surprisingly simple. Sandvik says shes surprised that the FBI would be the first to discover a vulnerability that simple when there were Silk Road users hunting for bugs daily on the website.

Beyond satisfying curiosity, the way the Silk Road servers were seized has important implications for evidence in Ulbrichts case. According to the fruit of a poisonous tree argument presented by Ulbrichts attorney Joshua Dratel in the July motion, if the original searches violated Ulbrichts rights, then all evidence stemming from those searches should be suppressed.

The rebuttal makes the claim that all FBI searches were legal and not violations of Ulbrichts rights. In short, notwithstanding the lengthy exposition of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence in Ulbrichts briefmost of which has nothing to do with this casehis various claims are bereft of any support of the law, the rebuttal reads. Because the servers were located overseas, the FBI says it didnt need a warrant to ask foreign authorities to search the serves, and the rest of the 59-page rebuttal argues for the legality of the rest of the searches leading up to Ulbrichts arrest.

Presented with both the defenses motion and the prosecutions rebuttal, the courts will make a decision about whether to uphold or deny the motion to suppress evidence because of a Fourth Amendment rights violation. In July, Judge Katherine Forrest denied Ulbrichts first motion to dismiss charges. That motion asked if Ulbricht could be charged with money laundering when Bitcoin isnt recognized as currency, and if he could be charged with drug trafficking for simply running the Silk Road website.

Ulbricht has pleaded not guilty to all charges, and his trial is scheduled to begin on November 3, 2014.

Check out the rest of the Forbes Silk Road coverage here.

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The Feds Explain How They Seized The Silk Road Servers