Darknet – anonymous and secret corners of the Internet. Darknet - shadow Internet, or how the Tor browser can be dangerous Why the Darknet is dangerous

When reading the description of the Tor browser on software portals, we usually see characteristics only in a positive way. It is positioned as a mechanism for protecting rights on the Internet, a tool for bypassing the ubiquitous control of intelligence agencies, and a means of combating Internet censorship. A browser that offers the most reliable online anonymity mechanism completely free of charge. It is used to transmit information by journalists, famous people, anti-corruption activists, government officials, and other users who fear surveillance and seizure of information. And residents of totalitarian states can have contact with the outside world, in particular with democratic countries.

What are the dangers of Tor?

A well-known fact: Tor is banned in some countries, including Russia. And the reason for this is the browser’s creators ignoring Internet censorship. In the Russian Federation, violation of this ban is expected to block public Tor servers. There are no sanctions for ordinary users yet.

But owners of Tor system proxy servers may have problems related to liability not only for ignoring censorship. Enthusiasts who provide the end nodes of the onion network—the so-called exit nodes—are at greatest risk. The Tor system is built on the principle of transmitting encrypted information through several proxy servers. The IP address of the last proxy can be determined by intelligence agencies. And this has already happened in a number of countries, including Russia. A well-known fact: in April 2017, Russian citizen Yuri Bogatov was arrested for allegedly publishing calls for terrorism on the Internet and organizing mass riots. The defender presented irrefutable evidence that Bogatov himself did not make any publications, but his home computer was configured as an output node of the Tor network. However, Yuri still had to spend 3.5 months in a pre-trial detention center.

The preventive measure was subsequently changed to house arrest, but the case has not yet been closed. Enthusiasm is, of course, good, but it must be healthy.

For ordinary users who do not own Tor endpoints, the danger lies in the onion network itself. The Tor browser is a software environment for accessing the Darknet, the shadow side of the Internet. You cannot get here using Google or Yandex; shadow web resources will not open in a regular browser window, even using a direct link. You can only access the Darknet using Tor.

What is Darknet

It exists in the form of an internal Tor network with the “.onion” domain, which is also hosting for all shady sites. Everything is confidential on the Darknet - site creators create them anonymously, users visit them anonymously. This is because the subject of discussion and transactions on shady sites are goods, services and content prohibited by the laws of many countries.

On Darknet sites, forums and communities you can purchase drugs, weapons, fake documents, counterfeit banknotes, sophisticated porn, stolen goods and other prohibited goods. Bitcoin currency is usually used to make transactions. Just as the Tor system allows the buyer and seller to remain anonymous, so with the help of Bitcoin it will not be possible to subsequently identify the sender and recipient of a money transfer.

Like the regular Internet, the Darknet has its own search engines, only intranet search engines.

But they search for information only from web resources available on the Internet. Some forums and communities of the .onion network are unindexed or completely closed. Only their own people or those who have received an invitation from such people can get to the latter. The darknet is a gathering place for hackers. It is here, and most often in closed communities, that cybercriminals communicate with each other, share experiences, and recruit newcomers. Naturally, piracy flourishes on the dark Internet. Here we will find genuine mirrors of well-known torrent trackers that are officially blocked in a number of countries.

The very bottom of the shadow Internet - human trafficking, ordering a killer, interactive rape, torture and murder of people

The darknet consists mostly of English-language sites, but there are also Russian-language ones. On the shadow Internet we will not find web resources with any kind of sophisticated or modern design; everything is done either in garish bad taste or in the style of poor minimalism.

We won’t see verbiage in articles about anything optimized for top search queries. Here the entire emphasis is shifted to the specifics and usefulness of information, as was once the case in the early days of the development of the regular Internet. The darknet is a kind of excursion into the past of the regular Internet, but the excursion, alas, is unsafe.

Why is the Darknet dangerous?

Visiting the Darknet in itself is not a criminal offense. Any of us can visit one or another shady site out of curiosity. It's like walking through dangerous areas of the city. The danger lies in the possible consequences of such a walk, regardless of whether we commit an illegal act or not. Thus, a potential threat hangs over every user of the shadow Internet: fraud, scams and hacking flourish here.

If we are talking about illegal actions, then it is naive to believe that the existence of the shadow Internet within the Tor network is a guarantee of the safety of illegal transactions. In addition to the anonymity mechanism offered by the browser, there are a lot of different nuances - from its correct configuration for the Darknet to the method of receiving purchased products.

On the Darknet, intelligence agencies cannot identify criminals in the same way as on the regular Internet - through filtering information on the public network. But nothing prevents them from acting according to the test purchase scheme. Intelligence officers can monitor the shadow Internet and, under the guise of buyers/sellers, negotiate the purchase/sale of prohibited goods. And when planning the delivery of prohibited goods across the border, do not forget about such a structure as the customs service.

Here are some facts from judicial practice Russian Federation in cases in which Tor appears as an instrument for committing a crime

Judicial practice of the Russian Federation in “Darknet” cases

By the verdict of the Leninsky Court of Cheboksary in July 2017, a Russian received a 4-year suspended sentence for purchasing narcotic drugs on one of the Darknet sites. Package with drugs in the form registered letter was sent by a seller from Germany, but was opened and recorded at customs in Vnukovo. The parcel was sent to Cheboksary accompanied by employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Since the letter went from Germany to Russia, drug smuggling appears as an illegal act in the verdict.

Note: Drugs on the dark internet can be ordered in "stash" form, such as a Coca-Cola bottle. Such props will deceive us humans, but not our four-legged friends. Trained customs dogs search for drugs at the border.

2.6 years of serving in penal colony strict regime received by a student from Russia following the verdict of the Leninsky Court in Voronezh, issued in August 2017. The student organized a trading platform for the sale of drugs on the Darknet and supplied them through hiding places.

It would seem that everything is known about the World Wide Web, but in reality there are hidden places that some users are still just beginning to learn about. We invite you to find out what the black Internet is and how to enter the black Internet.

What is the black internet?

Not every user of the World Wide Web knows that there is access to the black Internet. It is also often called the deep or dark internet. There is often a lot of confusion with these terms, but by and large they all mean the same thing - the hidden part of the Internet. There are sites here that are not indexed by search engines and therefore can only be reached using a direct link.

There are also sites among them that require you to know and use a password to access. There are also resources that work on the TOR network. Sites in this network have their own domain – ONION, which is not officially registered anywhere. However, this does not prevent you from using it if you have software for working with TOR. Using this domain, you can easily distinguish links to regular sites on the traditional network from links to black Internet resources hosted on the TOR network.

Does the black internet exist?

Myth or reality? There are actually quite a few rumors and speculations floating around the deep web. However, we can say with confidence that such a network exists. At the same time, access to the black Internet is not difficult. Anyone who wants to learn as much as possible about the hidden part of the World Wide Web can get there. Anyone who still doubts can try to get into the deep network now.

Black Internet - what is there?

The very name of the network is frightening and alarming, but at the same time it arouses the interest of the average user and the desire to find out what is on the black Internet. This place is a network invisible to the user and search robots. Due to the fact that search engines cannot index information on this network, it is not so easy for the average user to see the information posted here.

For its anonymity, this part of the Internet is loved by everyone who wants to remain anonymous and those involved in illegal activities. Thus, with the help of the sites located here, illegal substances, pornography, etc. are sold. The problem is that new ones grow in place of closed large resources and it is much more difficult to fight them than with the same, for example, drug laboratories in real life. Yes, and identifying and arresting a seller who is located on one side of the planet and using a server on the other side of the planet is not always within the capabilities of the law enforcement officers.

Black Internet - how to get there?

Nowadays, probably only the lazy don’t know how to use the Internet. However, there is a network that not everyone knows about. Having heard about the deep Internet, an ordinary user often thinks about something special and very complex. However, in reality, understanding how to access the black Internet is very easy. To make such a trip, you need to have the desire and access to the World Wide Web. To go to the deep Internet, you need to install a browser on your computer - TOR.

How to get to the deep Internet through TOP?

Finding yourself in a black network is not very difficult. To access the deep Internet, the TOR Browser is often used. It has the following properties:

1. TOR is able to ensure communication confidentiality and prevent navigation surveillance.
2. Protects against various types of surveillance by website owners and providers.
3. Hides data about the user's physical location.
4. Capable of blocking all security threats.
5. Does not require special installation and runs from all media.
6. Does not require special knowledge and is accessible to beginners.

How to use the black internet?

To understand how to surf the dark web, you need to understand that there can be no search engines there and all transitions are made through existing lists of links. You also need to know that the speed of the black Internet is so slow that you can’t do it without patience. Otherwise, everything is intuitive. Before going deep, users want to know what they can find on the black internet. Those who have been here say that the deep network provides:

1. Market for counterfeit documents and identity documents.
2. Places where illegal substances are traded.
3. Equipment and equipment stores.
4. Sale credit cards– data is obtained from skimmers installed on ATMs. Such information will not cost much, but the PIN code and scan of the card will cost more.

Why is the black internet dangerous?

Going to the black internet or can it be dangerous? Such thoughts can occur to anyone who first heard about the existence of the other side of the World Wide Web. In fact, downloading a browser and logging into the deep Internet itself does not pose any danger. However, if there is such a desire to use the capabilities of the black Internet, then it’s worth thinking about how such an adventure could end.

Only part of the information contained on the Internet can be found on Google and other search engines. Data stored on the so-called “deep” and “dark web” is closed to them. This vast parallel universe serves both legal and illegal purposes.

Secret societies on the Internet?

The ability to hide data from search engines is used by both the owners of regular websites and the organizers of anonymous networks that partly make up the so-called “dark web” - segments of the global global network not connected to the Internet. The idea behind anonymous user networks is similar to the concept of secret societies and real-world Masonic lodges. By the way, in itself it has nothing to do with illegal activity. The principle is simple: anyone who is personally acquainted with at least one member of the lodge can be invited to general meetings of all members. They take place in publicly accessible places, but only the initiated know what exactly is happening, when and where. On the Internet it looks like this: Anonymous networks use the same technologies as other online services: web pages, email, file sharing. In principle, they could be available to everyone - but only if that "everyone" uses certain software and knows what and who they need to find.

Anonymous networks originated as a response from the computer community to the excessive zeal of copyright holders and authorities to limit the distribution of digital content and information back in the late 90s of the last century and have been constantly improved since then. After law enforcement agencies all over the world turned their attention to file-sharing services and began to persecute their most active participants, the owners of such resources began to look for ways to continue their activities without hindrance and developed a hidden analogue of decentralized peer-to-peer networks (Peer-to-Peer, P2P, “peer to peer”), such like Napster, EDonkey or BitTorrent.

In P2P file-sharing networks, there are usually central servers called trackers that allow all users to find each other and exchange MP3 files, videos, programs, images and any other information in digital form - naturally, without worrying about copyrights and other related legalities details. There are no such servers in anonymous networks - all information is stored distributedly on users’ computers.

Anonymous networks and the dark web

In most cases, information located on the “dark web” cannot be accessed via the Internet, since such segments of the global Network may not have a connection to it at all. To get into anonymous networks, you will need to install special software, which is included on the CHIP DVD.

ANts P2P written in the Java programming language and allows anyone to anonymously share files. Traffic is exchanged not directly, but through several intermediary nodes. Each Ants P2P participant knows only the address of the neighboring computer, so it is impossible to find out who is transferring the file and where. Transmitted data is encrypted using the AES algorithm for greater security.

Purpose: anonymous file sharing. Website: antsp2p.sourceforge.net

Bitmessage is designed for exchanging securely encrypted messages and was conceived as an alternative to email and other instant messengers, the data from which can end up in the hands of intelligence services at any time. The architecture of Bitmessage is similar to the architecture of the Bitcoin network intended for exchange in cash, but optimized for messaging. Exchange is possible not only between individual users, but also between groups. After Edward Snowden revealed information about mass surveillance of Internet users by intelligence agencies, Bitmessage became truly popular.

Purpose: anonymous exchange of funds. Website: www.bitcoin.org

Friendly exchange

Unlike the Internet, some anonymous networks are not accessible to everyone. Their creators had one goal: to avoid surveillance by the authorities, who themselves often break the law by monitoring their citizens. The anonymity system developed for this purpose attracted not only fighters for freedom of information and exchange of opinions, but also lovers of various illegal content and pirated copies.

Hidden networks created inside the Internet, by analogy with P2P, began to be abbreviated as F2F (Friend-to-Friend, “to each other”). This term was first coined in 2000 by programmer Daniel Bricklin, who became famous as the developer of the first spreadsheet for the PC. Unlike some P2P networks, they do not have central servers and users cannot share files with anyone.

To get in touch with your friends, each network participant must know their addresses and have their numbers Business Cards(certificates). For the uninitiated, there is no way to track file sharing. If your friends do not have the information you are interested in, then the anonymous mode of operation, which is supported by most existing F2F networks, will come to the rescue. In this case, it is possible to establish a connection between unfamiliar users. Computer addresses and all personal data of their owners remain secret.

Freenet as salvation from censorship

One of the most popular F2F networks is Freenet (not to be confused with the name of some Internet providers). Thanks to special software, it uses the already existing infrastructure of the World Wide Web and conventional network operators with their access to the Internet - but at the same time, it fences itself off from the traditional Network with all its might.

Freenet is not just about sharing information between individuals. There are also classic websites within this anonymous network, but there are no URLs in the sense that Internet users are familiar with. In addition, there is an email system isolated from the Web, discussion forums (FMS and Frost) and an analogue of a social network (Sone). All information available on Freenet is stored distributed on the hard drives of users' computers in encrypted form, and a complex routing system is used to access it. All this guarantees almost complete anonymity, but imposes a number of restrictions. Compared to the Internet, the Freenet network is much slower. Some are not yet available modern technologies- for example, dynamic content generation using databases and scripts, widely used on the Internet.

The goal of the founders of the Freenet project was to create a global network where all users could remain anonymous and no one would be allowed to decide what is acceptable and what is not. This network promotes the spirit of free exchange of information and freedom of speech; Even the creators of Freenet do not have complete control over the system. In countries such as China, people especially need the free exchange of information without fear of government reprisals. Complete anonymity on Freenet and similar networks is achieved only when users come into contact with each other in an absolutely purposeful manner. But even if you allow connections with strangers, it will be incredibly difficult to identify computers exchanging information. Communication between the two partners is encrypted and is not direct. Data streams are transmitted through the computers of other users. It is extremely difficult for an outsider to trace the connections between individual participants.

Sites within Freenet remain invisible to traditional search engines and have no direct connection with the Global Network. You can only access them if you install the free Freenet software on your computer and connect to the network. Also, the personal data of their creators and the addresses of the computers on which they are located remain completely anonymous.

Over the years, the Freenet network has evolved and grown rapidly. Currently, there is a directory of freely accessible websites called Linkageddon. There is no search function, and Freenet users have to scroll through the unsorted array, encountering the most unexpected things. In addition to prohibited content, the list includes pages that offer pirated copies. Here, next to the resources that publish reliable information, you can find the page of some madman who, with pseudoscientific thoroughness, repeats all sorts of false fabrications. It is possible that the lack of censorship is widely used by someone to investigate illegal activities.

The Frost program, running within the Freenet network, is designed for the anonymous exchange of opinions, structured like forums, and files. The graphical shell of the application resembles the cover of an email client, and the interface is translated into several languages, including Russian. Frost has the same features as the Freenet network. Website: www.freenetproject.org/frost.html

Freenet Alternatives

Invisible Internet Project(abbreviated as I2P, Invisible Internet Project) is a clone of Freenet.

This network was created to provide anonymous access to various services, including blogs, instant messaging, Email, websites, file transfer services, etc. As its authors assure, the ultimate goal of the I2P project is the ability to function in harsh conditions, even under pressure from organizations with significant financial or political resources. Data transmitted over the network is encrypted, and the network itself is decentralized. You can connect to I2P networks not only from a computer, but also from smartphones or tablets running the Android system.

Purpose: multifunctional anonymous network. Website: www.i2p2.de

Hyperboria is an experimental decentralized network based on the cjdns network protocol. Transferring data to physical level can be carried out both using the Internet infrastructure and directly between routers, which allows you to create a completely Internet-independent global network with mesh topology. Traffic transmitted via Hyperbolia is encrypted, but the network is not anonymous - it is possible to establish both the address of the sender and the recipient of the data.

Purpose: anonymous exchange of files and messages. Website: retroshare.sourceforge.net

The Dark Web without the Shady Shenanigans

Anonymous networks don't have to be a platform for illegal activity, say Billy Hoffman and Matt Wood. Both work in the research and development department of IT giant Hewlett-Packard. In 2009, they first introduced Veiled (English: “hidden”) - new software for organizing user anonymous networks.

“We believe that anonymous networks could become much more widespread if there were no barriers for users to download, install and configure software,” says Billy Hoffman. And if anonymous networks became available to a wider audience, there would immediately be many opportunities to use them for legal purposes, experts believe.

When creating Veiled, the researchers thought about how to protect sites like WikiLeaks, which publish confidential government documents, from government pressure. Until now, the owners of the WikiLeaks project use ordinary web servers, which, due to legal or political pressure, may one day disappear from the Internet. If all their material were distributed decentralized through an anonymous network, WikiLeaks' opponents would become windmill wrestlers, since documents circulated on anonymous networks are not stored on servers, but distributed in small parts among different users. For example, the Freenet network mentioned above works on this principle.

Researchers from HP want to simplify anonymous networks and use regular browser technology in their program to do this. Veiled works without downloading or installation on devices such as the iPhone, as well as computers running Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems. At first glance, Veiled does not seem as powerful as mature and specialized software for anonymous networks, but it has everything essential functions, necessary for an anonymous network, including encryption of all data transmitted by participants and the ability to chat. Hoffman and Wood have prepared detailed documentation for Veiled so that other programmers can recreate their design. Veiled is good, but the two HP researchers will never publish it. The reason is a possible legal conflict with the company they work for. Nevertheless, the authors posted such a detailed presentation on the Internet that, according to Hoffman, other programmers will be able to easily develop an analogue of Veiled.

"Deep Web": more than WWW

The Dark Web is also invisible to search engines and their users, but is organized completely differently from anonymous networks. It is formed by huge databases with various information and pages of the regular Internet, which for a number of reasons are inaccessible to popular search engines. Users can access them only if they send a special request to the database or go to pages whose addresses are known to them in advance.

Now the owner of each website can determine for himself what part of his content should be included in the index of Google and other search engines, and whether it should be there at all. If the owner closes access to his resource to search robots, prohibits unregistered users from viewing pages, or does not bother to properly optimize his service, then his information will not appear in the lists of search results, even if there are links to it from tens of thousands of sites, indexed by search engines. Under normal circumstances, this would guarantee a top ranking in the SERPs. Search engines are, as it were, blind in one eye - and show their users only part of what is on the Internet.

A good example of the deep web is library directories. Although these lists of books and magazines are stored primarily on traditional web servers, access to them is only permitted after registration, which search engines cannot do. All they can do is, in a way, “look outside at the locked door” and move on. The same applies to databases with information about flights, special medical materials, various production documentation, social networks etc. True, Google, having purchased ITA Software (a division that develops software for the transport industry, previously an independent company), at least solved the problem with air travel: American Google users can already enter search queries like “cheapest flight from New York” York to Las Vegas" and get results.

Sometimes owners of resources whose information should not appear on the Internet make technical errors, as a result of which confidential information ends up in search results (all this data also refers to the “deep web”). A similar incident occurred on July 18, 2011, when Yandex indexed part of the SMS messages sent from the Megafon website to subscribers of the mobile operator. As Yandex specialists subsequently explained, in the SMS sending section on the Megafon page, at the time of indexing by the search engine, there was no robots.txt file, which contains commands for the search robot. In particular, it should indicate a ban on indexing confidential sections of the site. Now this information has already been removed from the search results, but attentive users managed to save it and post it on file-sharing networks, where it is available to this day. However, this is not yet a full immersion in the “deep web”.

Stalkers of the Deep Web

Search engines such as CompletePlanet and Scirus promise to open access to the depths of the Internet. They are structured differently than Google and Yandex, and allow you to find information in databases that traditional search engines give in to. For example, CompletePlanet, according to its creators, provides access to approximately 70,000 complexly indexed databases, and Scirus will help you find information in various scientific data archives.

Their work was made possible thanks to advanced search robots (the part of the search engine responsible for collecting information on websites). In particular, they are able to generate quite meaningful queries to databases and fill out forms for the user thanks to the support of specific languages.

Traditional search engines also strive to get to the information that is located on the deep Internet, which is not surprising - according to experts, it contains a thousand times more than on the surface. Google, for example, has developed a special format for site maps, thanks to which its search robots visit even those pages to which there are no links from other resources. Of course, the site owner must first create such a map. Gradually, search engines will index more and more information found on the deep web, and the line between the “surface” and “deep web” will blur. But some of it will still remain inaccessible to search - for example, paid content provided only by subscription.

First step into the deep web

You can plunge into the “deep web” even without installing special software - using special portals and search engines.

Project OAIster(oaister.worldcat.org), initiated by the University of Michigan, searches the metadata servers of more than 400 institutions around the world for documents. These are libraries, scientific organizations, journal editorial offices, etc. OAIster is of interest primarily to scientists, because it provides access to approximately 18 million data groups.

CompletePlanet(www.completeplanet.com) looks for information where Google and Yandex are unable to find it. Visitors to this search engine's site have access to more than 70,000 deep web databases and a directory of resources.

Retrofitting the browser

To get into some of the deep web's nooks and crannies, you need to upgrade your browser. To do this, you need to install an add-on - the Tor anonymization service (www.torproject.org), which allows users to remain undetected on the Internet thanks to Onion Routing technology. Data is transmitted to the Internet through a series of constantly changing proxy servers and is encrypted. Tor can be used to anonymously access the Internet and work with both applications that use the TCP protocol and internal hidden services that make up the dark web. They can only be accessed from the Tor network. The principle may seem simple at first glance, but in reality everything is much more complicated. The dark web does not have URLs in the traditional sense. For example, the addresses of hidden pages on the Tor network are cryptographic combinations of letters and numbers with the domain name “.onion”. They change often, so you have to look for them again every time.

“Of course this is illegal! And we condemn in every possible way, but we admire,” says an anonymous person in one of the videos about the darknet. His voice is changed, his face is covered. He talks about the secrets of the shadow Internet on YouTube. About secrets? On YouTube?.. Secrets begin right there, on the shadow Internet.

This article will be useful for those who want to find out without diving how deep the rabbit hole is and prevent loved ones from falling into it.

How it works

In addition to the regular Internet, where you are now reading this text, there is the so-called deep web (from the English deep web - deep web). Its contents are not indexed by search engines, and you cannot get there from a regular browser. The deep web is ten times larger than the regular Internet.

No, this is not entirely prohibited. Most of the deep web is occupied by databases, service parts of sites, and regular pages with the tag . But there is also a prohibition there, and it is called the darknet (from the English dark net - dark network).

To surf the darknet, you need a special browser, let's call it X. This software was invented by the American military in the mid-1990s, taking care of the secure transmission of intelligence data. It encrypts and transmits data through multiple clothing nodes. What exactly a person looks at and what sites he visits through this browser, the Internet provider does not know. For sites, the user also remains anonymous, only if he himself does not appear.

You can also connect to the darknet through a regular browser using special extensions. But their quality and your anonymity will be in question.

X connects to sites through multiple nodes around the world. A user who accesses a resource, for example, from China, may be led by the browser through Canada, South Africa and Chile.

Darknet sites are located in the pseudo-domain zone .onion, and their names are run through an encryption key and look like a 16-digit combination of letters and numbers. Such sites operate on virtual dedicated servers, that is, they are their own hosting providers. It is difficult to identify site administrators in the .onion zone, but it is possible, which is why darknet merchants often open new sites without waiting for problems on the old ones.

Darknet shops are not the business of one internet security hacker. Different people They sell goods and services here that cannot be found in the regular market. There are marketplace sites, sellers pay them a commission on each transaction. You may have heard the names of the largest sites: Silk Road, AlphaBay, Hansa. Their owners, administrators, a number of sellers and clients are already behind bars. And Ross Ulbricht, the founder of Silk Road, was given two whole life sentences for drug trafficking, hacking, money laundering and ordering six murders. Recently, US intelligence agencies busted yet another major drug trafficker on the darknet.

Illegal trading platforms have exploded with the advent of cryptocurrencies: buying and selling has become safer.

Darknet stores operate on a 100% prepayment basis. To ensure fair transactions, sites freeze quotas and dealer deposits; for transactions involving large amounts, administrators can act as a guarantor. Small shops work like coffee machines: you give him money and he gives you a bookmark. Dealers and other darknet hucksters launder the money they earn through “bitcoin laundries.” There are such people in Russia too, writes Lenta. “Laundries” cash out cryptocurrency for their percentage.

Through X you can also visit ordinary resources that are blocked for some reason. There are now 113 thousand entries in the “Unified Register of Prohibited Sites” of Roskomnadzor, and some are causing misunderstanding. The browser allows you to send important information and still remain anonymous.

Edward Snowden transmitted data to the media through X, and The New Yorker has an anonymous service for receiving incriminating evidence. Journalists use this browser to communicate with informants and receive data without censorship.

Darknet sites in general look primitive: no one spends money on expensive design, pages work without JavaScript, and usability and SEO in many places remain at the level of 2005 - flashy colors, capslock, clumsy layout.

There are a lot of myths around the darknet:

• . It's full of drug addicts and murderers;

• . users are allegedly kidnapped and taken to a “quiet house” or “red room”, where only one of the group will survive; perverts pay big money to watch this carnage;

• . the police are “making cases” against users who just came in to read; every second account on the darknet is a fake one, followed by the FSB/CIA.

Yes, they offer prohibited goods and services (however, many of them can also be found on the regular Internet), but there is also simply specific (not prohibited) information. The darknet attracts not only drug dealers and pedophiles, it is full of cypherpunks (from the English cypherpunk) - people interested in cryptography, evangelists of anonymity on the Internet. They all want to communicate without fear of criminal prosecution for the meme.

On one large Russian-language torrent tracker in the .onion zone, 400-500 new distributions appear per day, and most of them are ordinary content. For example, the works of Aristotle in Latin with comments by Averroes or the overtures of Beethoven.

Is there anything?..

On trading platforms darknet sells and buys

Specific services

For money, darknet craftsmen can obtain citizenship of an inconspicuous country like Belize or Romania. What about delivering contraband or “squeezing out” property? Certainly. “Break through” the Ministry of Internal Affairs bases and take video from surveillance cameras? Easily! Consult on “chemical issues” or create a “personality” on the Internet? It's already ready.

Rare instructions

From how to steal a car to how to communicate with a comrade major and “lay low.” There are many “gray” schemes such as discounts on taxi services, purchasing a gift certificate 2-5 times cheaper than the face value.

Very profitable offers

“Travel agencies” are willing to send you on vacation on the cheap: for a nominal 50 thousand instead of 300 thousand they will take you to the Maldives. True, there is a chance that you will end up behind bars from the beach, because the “travel agency” will pay for you with “dirty” money, and you will give them your hard-earned money.

Vacancies without social package

Citizens hungry for easy money on the dark web can find work as a “runner”, “kladman”, “casher”, earn a lot, but not for long.

And also:

• . prohibited substances;
• . personal data (correspondence, documents, login information for accounts and electronic wallets);
• . counterfeit money;
• . stolen electronics;
• . fake documents;
• . weapon;
• . wiretapping equipment;
• . compromising evidence on famous people;
• . hacking software, etc.

The darknet is not as big as it seems

There are about 2 billion sites on the regular Internet, and on the darknet, even according to the most daring estimates, up to 1 million (more likely, several hundred thousand). There are quite harmless resources here: torrent trackers, libraries, social networks, blogging platforms, chat rooms, and even its own Wikipedia, The Hidden Wiki. A number of well-known sites - Facebook, WikiLeaks, Encyclopedia Dramatica, etc. - have “mirrors” here.

Yandex and Google do not work in browser X; they recognize your requests as automatic.

The largest and oldest Russian-language darknet forum is Runion. Its administrator - the once legendary, and now hated Zed - once stole the deposits of buyers in one of the branches. After this, users boycotted the site.

What will it cost you?

The purchase and sale of all of the above goods and services is punishable by law! For actions on a virtual network you can get a real sentence.

• — Acquisition, storage, transportation, manufacture and sale of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues. Production, sale, storage and distribution of plants containing precursors of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances. Articles 228-231 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation provide fine up to 1 million rubles and imprisonment for up to 10 years.

• — Illegal acquisition, transfer, sale, storage, transportation or carrying of weapons, their main parts, ammunition. Article 222 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation promises fine up to 200 thousand rubles and prison term up to eight years. Even for the illegal sale of bladed weapons and gas weapons, you can receive a minimum of 480 hours of compulsory labor, and a maximum of imprisonment for up to two years.

• — Forgery, production or sale of counterfeit documents. Article 327 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation provides imprisonment for up to two years. And for the same actions committed with the aim of concealing another crime or facilitating its commission - up to four years.

How to tell if someone is hanging out on the dark web

Let's make a reservation: using the darknet does not make the user a criminal. But if this is a child, a person with mental disorders or drug addiction, it may be worth intervening.

Obviously

• 1. On the desktop there is an icon of an onion in section or of the Earth with light green continents and gray oceans. Icons can be called anything you like, they can be renamed.

• 2. A person uses a browser that is not maximized to full screen and does not show the contents of the pages. X by default does not expand to 100% of the screen, thereby hiding the hardware configuration.

• 3. The user found some kind of offline job, for which he acquired a dozen simple phones and SIM cards, and created “left” accounts on social networks. May be absent for a long time, leaving at night.

• 4. Installed a system unit or rack with processors and hard drives, calls it an “exit (exit) node” and forbids touching it.

Not obvious

• 1. B telephone conversations uses slang words with other people: “onion”, “plastic”, “dirt”, “treasure”, “ay-to-pi” (I2P), “freenet” (Freenet), “mine”, “synthetics”, “salt” ", "meth", "glass", "brand".

• 2. Buys and spends cryptocurrency for unspecified purposes.

How to talk about prohibition with children is the topic of a separate article. In this we will say that in the antivirus settings you can prohibit the installation of certain programs. Better yet, allow software installation only for account admin and password protect it. Let the children surf the Internet under their own “account”.

conclusions

The darknet has a special atmosphere. It’s like you’re walking through a strange neighborhood, where even a child on a bicycle can sell weed, and an old man on a bench can shoot with a sawn-off shotgun. Criminal prosecution is not the only possible consequence of commodity-money relations on the darknet.

What else can you run into?

• . The stolen item that you buy cheap from a “huckster” has an owner, he can find you and hurt you.

• . The seller can get real information about you and blackmail you.

• . You can simply be deceived, this happens here all the time.

• . If you are not tech savvy, dark web scammers can hack your computer (you click on a bad link, voluntarily install spyware), steal information and money.

• . Children and people with unstable mental health can suffer psychological trauma.

• . A programmer who is asked to write a harmless script for good money may be drawn into a criminal scheme as an accomplice or accomplice. Truly harmless software is not ordered on the darknet.

• . The seller may be an employee of the authorities. Such acquaintance is not always fraught with trial. Theoretically, you can get extorted, become an informant or a “live bait” in other cases.

These are the most obvious consequences of the dark web craze. Avoid it. You can use LinkedIn and watch regular films that are not approved by the Ministry of Culture without the darknet.

Text: Alexander Litvin, Illustrations: Sergey Babich

For Android: try this option and be sure to write how you like it.

Over the past few years, I have heard the concept more and more often - the Deep Internet. But I never thought about how to get there. And so, after digging around a little, I decided to look into this topic.

There is an opinion on the Internet that the deep Internet stores almost 100,000 TB of information, while the regular Internet stores no more than 2000 TB. Almost all information on the dark side of the internet is open and free. The Deep Web is not indexed by Google or Yandex search engines.

How to get there

If you want to visit such a domain through a regular browser, you will see this.

Well, if through TorBrowser, then the page will naturally open. In the screenshot below I opened the local Wikipedia (Hidden Wiki)

What can you find on the Deep Web?

Because the deep internet is used by hackers, criminals, and law enforcement agencies, it is considered a dangerous place. It's really not entirely clear why.

Somehow it so happened that the first thing I came across was the Runion forum, which had things that amazed me.

I’m not even sure whether it’s worth writing about this at all, since modern laws of the Russian Federation can punish for this. I just hope that all the people who sell weapons on the forum are police officers, thus identifying alleged criminals.

I was surprised not so much by the fact that they sell firearms, but by the fact that for communication they use strange boxes like: 4d2b151932e7 and require letters to be encrypted.

Most sellers only accept Bitcoin as payment. A little later I found a service that allows you to send messages to such strange addresses.

On the forum there are orders for body armor and even acetone. There are even SIM cards that are designed in legal entities. Lots of threads about politics, mercenary camps and the like.

The portal http://doe6ypf2fcyznaq5.onion/ has a catalog of popular resources. Among the harmless ones is a virtual confessional, in which you can absolutely anonymously ask priests from the local religion to forgive your sins.