Can anyone explain the "Dark Net" to me ?

I am curious about the Dark Net.

Is it just for criminals, Drug Dealers and free porn ?

Can I mess up my IPad by using the DN ?

Can I even access the DN from my IPad ?

It seems the more I read the more confused I get.

Is there a Dark Net for Dummies ?

Any comments are welcome...

From MY personal experiences, the only thing I know about the dark web is that it is related to the tor? I have seen friends access SR but that is all.

Although, I hear that there is a huge collection of data and information not attainable on the regular internet. Unfortunately I am not tech savvy enough to provide more details.

Hopefully someone will come to the rescue and educate us both!

From what I understand about it, is that only a small percentage of the internet is actually interlinked by using searchable queries and the dark web is the rest that is not searchable. Pretty much all the stuff you can't find by google and other search engines comprises a large part of the dark net, you need to know exactly where to look for that kind of info. I could be wrong but thats kind of the jist I got when someone once explained it to me.

It seems...

The first rule of Dark Net is,

Don't talk about Dark Net.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
I am curious about the Dark Net.

The dark net consist of multiple ".onion" sites that are only accessible on the TOR network. So instead of ".com", these sites use ".onion". The only way to access these sites is through the Tor internet browser, which protects you and gives you anonymity.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Is it just for criminals, Drug Dealers and free porn ?

It is mostly for criminals, drug dealers and child porn. BUT it also contains forums and archives dedicated to free information sharing on a vast array of subjects.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Can I mess up my IPad by using the DN ?

Not really, unless you start downloading shady stuff...

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Can I even access the DN from my IPad ?

Search your app store for "Tor" and there might be some browsers available on your iPad. I know for sure you can do it on Android.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Is there a Dark Net for Dummies ?

The starting place for the dark net would be the "Hidden Wiki" which is a unofficial wiki containing links towards the most popular destinations.


I won't link anything here but a quick google search for the quoted terms will give you results.

a reply to: whyamIhere

Youtube has tutorials on how to access the dark web.

That said I would think hard about going there. It's not called the dark web for nothing.

I tried a search once for a certain music transcription software and was greeted with disturbing and repulsive imagery I wish I never saw.

originally posted by: MrMaybeNot

originally posted by: whyamIhere
I am curious about the Dark Net.

The dark net consist of multiple ".onion" sites that are only accessible on the TOR network. So instead of ".com", these sites use ".onion". The only way to access these sites is through the Tor internet browser, which protects you and gives you anonymity.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Is it just for criminals, Drug Dealers and free porn ?

It is mostly for criminals, drug dealers and child porn. BUT it also contains forums and archives dedicated to free information sharing on a vast array of subjects.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Can I mess up my IPad by using the DN ?

Not really, unless you start downloading shady stuff...

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Can I even access the DN from my IPad ?

Search your app store for "Tor" and there might be some browsers available on your iPad. I know for sure you can do it on Android.

originally posted by: whyamIhere
Is there a Dark Net for Dummies ?

The starting place for the dark net would be the "Hidden Wiki" which is a unofficial wiki containing links towards the most popular destinations.


I won't link anything here but a quick google search for the quoted terms will give you results.

Awesome information...

👍

It isn't anything most people would even bother to go through the trouble
for. There is plenty of legitimate material you can access there but there
is also allot of untoward and flat out sick stuff on there as well.

Reality is that its just not as exciting for us average joes because we aren't
shopping for credit cards to scam with or things like that so the "Normal internet"
is basically just as useful to us and not as annoying to access.

The one thing you could find there are some books that have been banned and
are more difficult yet still not impossible to find on the normal web.

I have no clue about accessing it via your ipad honestly as i have only ever done
it via a windows PC, also don't use tor, if you really want to find your way there
it can be done via other avenues, i don't feel comfortable telling you how to access
it though. Sorry. Honestly these days i wouldn't even access it, could get you put
on some watch list lol.

originally posted by: dezertdog
a reply to: whyamIhere

Youtube has tutorials on how to access the dark web.

That said I would think hard about going there. It's not called the dark web for nothing.

I tried a search once for a certain music transcription software and was greeted with disturbing and repulsive imagery I wish I never saw.

I am more curious than anything.

I have no business on the Dark Net.

Sounds kind of like BBS some of us started with.

I saw stuff on Bulletin Boards that would cost most people a couple years of therapy.

Don't forget you also have to turn your firewall off before you can even access the .onion websites through TOR, otherwise it won't work. If that's worth the risk for you, feel free to check it out.

originally posted by: TheProphetMark
Don't forget you also have to turn your firewall off before you can even access the .onion websites through TOR, otherwise it won't work. If that's worth the risk for you, feel free to check it out.

I never had to turn my firewall off... On windows at least.

originally posted by: MrMaybeNot

originally posted by: TheProphetMark
Don't forget you also have to turn your firewall off before you can even access the .onion websites through TOR, otherwise it won't work. If that's worth the risk for you, feel free to check it out.

I never had to turn my firewall off... On windows at least.

You could be right. I don't even know, it's been a while since I ventured the dark net. I just remember I had to turn off my firewall on Windows XP before I could even get the .onion websites working through TOR. It wouldn't work unless the firewall was off so I don't know how you did it.

Maybe I'm just doing it wrong.

*Edit*

Looks like you're right. My firewall is on and the .onion site worked. Not sure why it didn't before.

The TOR network just reroutes your computer's address.. IP... through a constantly shifting series of servers, so you can look at stuff anonymously... which is why it's so slow.

True, there are sick things there... like child porn... and free markets where one can use Paypal and buy drugs, etc., but there is also a huge amount of info being discussed that can be quite interesting.

You need to download the TOR browser and have an address to visit as regular searches don't work... though there are wikis that list the latest .onion addresses. You may also use TOR to surf the regular net with added anonymity.

Unfortunately, with the NSA, etc., I doubt it's truly anonymous, anymore, and if you use it to do the sick stuff, then expect a visit from law enforcement... but I've spent a few hours looking at the wide spectrum of human behavior and thought... and was appalled only about half the time...heh.

But it's likely the risk outweighs the curiosity factor... unless one really knows what they are doing ...and even though the child porn and the like is detestable, it's not all like that.

a reply to: whyamIhere

I believe it's bad #, tons of kiddie porn, satan crap. Etc.

I'd stay the hell away from it. Hope that helps

One more word of warning. Be careful if you decide to use Tor. Some ISP's (like Comcast) will terminate your service if they find you are using it. IMO you'd also end up on some other nasty lists as well.

originally posted by: bloodreviara
It isn't anything most people would even bother to go through the trouble
for. There is plenty of legitimate material you can access there but there
is also allot of untoward and flat out sick stuff on there as well.

Reality is that its just not as exciting for us average joes because we aren't
shopping for credit cards to scam with or things like that so the "Normal internet"
is basically just as useful to us and not as annoying to access.

The one thing you could find there are some books that have been banned and
are more difficult yet still not impossible to find on the normal web.

I have no clue about accessing it via your ipad honestly as i have only ever done
it via a windows PC, also don't use tor, if you really want to find your way there
it can be done via other avenues, i don't feel comfortable telling you how to access
it though. Sorry. Honestly these days i wouldn't even access it, could get you put
on some watch list lol.

To be honest, I think being a member of this site gets you on a watch list. I mean it is a CIA counter intellligence operation after all. And hell, isnt Prism putting us all on a watch list anyway?

Still, since the FBI shut down Silk Road the first time and introduced the .json script into Tor, I havent used it. I think that ship sailed. Besides I never did find anything really worth the trouble anyway. Maybe because I was too worried about stumbling across some sick porn.

originally posted by: TheProphetMark
Don't forget you also have to turn your firewall off before you can even access the .onion websites through TOR, otherwise it won't work. If that's worth the risk for you, feel free to check it out.

I never had to do that.

Worked fine with a firewall for me.

The Dark Net is 'Newspeak' to frighten the masses into allowing the governments to control access to the internet...

nothing more, nothing less...

Every computer on the Internet has an IP address that is either allocated statically by the ISP or by system admins. With residential internet IP addresses are usually allocated dynamically. With IPv4, you have a four byte number eg. 123.45.67.89, with IPv6, you have six a byte address.

Not all IP addresses have a domain name allocated to them (as in "abovetopsecret.com") or even have internet protocol services like www (thus www.abovetopsecret..com) running. But they may have private web servers running on custom ports. In that case, they can be accessed directly using the IP address and port eg. 123.45.67.89:8080, while protected by a username/password subscription account. That would still be too obvious, so they add another layer of obscurity by using encrpytion via https or even Tor.

Even though these computers may be desktops or laptops and behind a firewall blocking everything else, these ports can still be accessible if the firewall has special rules allowing it. Give the size of hard disk drives (up to 6 Terabytes) and the number of disk drive bays on PC's, you could have a server with over 20 Terabytes of data acesssible to only those who know.
These computers might even be regular web servers, but hacked to create hidden directories.

So the darknet could in theory be as large as all the private disk space in the world, yet totally unaccessible otherwise.

originally posted by: stormcell
Every computer on the Internet has an IP address that is either allocated statically by the ISP or by system admins. With residential internet IP addresses are usually allocated dynamically. With IPv4, you have a four byte number eg. 123.45.67.89, with IPv6, you have six a byte address.

Not all IP addresses have a domain name allocated to them (as in "abovetopsecret.com") or even have internet protocol services like www (thus www.abovetopsecret..com) running. But they may have private web servers running on custom ports. In that case, they can be accessed directly using the IP address and port eg. 123.45.67.89:8080, while protected by a username/password subscription account. That would still be too obvious, so they add another layer of obscurity by using encrpytion via https or even Tor.

Even though these computers may be desktops or laptops and behind a firewall blocking everything else, these ports can still be accessible if the firewall has special rules allowing it. Give the size of hard disk drives (up to 6 Terabytes) and the number of disk drive bays on PC's, you could have a server with over 20 Terabytes of data acesssible to only those who know.
These computers might even be regular web servers, but hacked to create hidden directories.

So the darknet could in theory be as large as all the private disk space in the world, yet totally unaccessible otherwise.

I was going to equate the internet to a store's floor & stock room, and the Dark Net to the store's warehouse, but this is much, much better at describing it