The Dark Web
In my line of work (IT), I sometimes receive requests from home users as well as corporates to set them up with access to the Dark Web.
As most people will probably know, there are three layers to the World Wide Web, the most obvious and most popular being the Surface Web, where the majority of users have easy access too, as well as doing most of their surfing via their standard browsers like Chrome and Firefox.
Below that there is something called the Deep Web.
Surprisingly the Deep Web is far larger than the Surface Web, and yet is more difficult to access primarily because in simplistic terms its an encrypted repository for corporate, government and security forces and many other organisations. It is essentially a non-indexed encrypted storage area for millions of databases, most of which are not accessible/visible via the Surface Web or standard browsers.
And then we have the Dark Web.
This is buried far deeper than the Deep Web, and even harder to access (Tor and a good VPN are good starting points). When people talk about the Dark Web there’s immediate thoughts of child pornography, drugs/people/firearms trafficking, computer hackers, kidnappings, discussions on espionage, assassinations and other major illegal activities – most claims of which are probably true!
Most everyone has heard of The Dark Web, even governments and security services. And yet it is completely unsupervised and there’s no overall jurisdiction, purely because it is almost impossible to shut down owing to how it is set up across a multitude of complex and highly encrypted networks around the world.
As a consequence terrorists, kidnappers, drug lords, peter files, fraudsters and a whole load of other gangsters probably spend all their time down there, organising their next crime more or less with impunity because plod wouldn’t have a clue where to start in finding them!
You would have to use a solid VPN in order to not attract the attention of your ISP, but apart from that (and a good AV) you can access the Dark Web without any worries about being arrested (unless you’re caught accessing/buying/selling illegal stuff.)
Going back to my opening point: I do inform my customers about the Dark Web, the risks involved and the content held therein. I even have to give them a disclaimer to sign before I do the work, but they still insist on having access.
There is nothing illegal about having access to it, so I can’t notify the police or the internet enforcement bodies. And its not all bad, but common sense suggests that whatever someone is doing down there can’t be for the common good
Nominated by: Technocunt
