How To Access The Deep Web or DarkNet – A Beginner’s Guide

You may have heard that there is some mysterious hidden internet called the ‘Deep Web’ or the ‘DarkNet’ that you can’t get to from Google, and which is hidden from most web surfers. Perhaps tales of the dark marketplaces selling all kinds of legal and illicit goods anonymously for Bitcoin have picqued your curiosity, and you would like to take a look around and see what they are like. Perhaps you live in a country where social media and ordinary internet sites are censored and you would like to visit a place where everyone is free to speak their mind freely and without fear of repurcussion. Or perhaps you simply care about your privacy and security online and are attracted to the idea of an internet space where users are not constantly tracked, monitored, and analysed by manipulative marketeers, government spies and malicious hackers. All of these are common reasons why people become interested in visiting this hidden, anonymous internet space – but if you are like 99% of people you probably don’t have a clue how to access the so-called ‘darknet’ or ‘deep web’.

Many people find the idea of even trying to access and use the deep web a little bit intimidating and scary, and if you are a complete beginner to this kind of stuff you are probably feeling the same. You may be concerned over what you will see, who you might meet, or what other concequences there may be for using something so strongly linked in the popular imagination to illicit activity. Please do not worry. You will not find anything which you haven’t looked for, and the beauty of the darknet is that nobody you meet will know who you are – you are just another anon – and there is a great security in that. You will be safe and you will suffer no negative consequences for visiting the darknet. You will also have no technical trouble learning how to access the darknet and find your way around once you have read this beginner’ guide which will hopefully tell you everything you need to know!

 How To Access The Deep Web or DarkNet – A Beginner’s Guide

As stated above, the deep web is not a single location, but a whole class of different locations which share one thing in common – that they are hidden from search engines and regular internet users. Different areas of the deep web therefore have different requirements for you to be able to access them, and any technology which you use will only give you access to its specific area of the hidden internet. Having said that, there is a very small number of technologies used to create what is popularly called the ‘deep web’ or ‘darknet’, and one in particular which the vast majority of people use – TOR.

TOR is an acronym which stands for ‘The Onion Router’. It got that name because of the many layers you would have to peel back to find the real identity of any of its users.

Tor is primarily a ‘privacy network’ which lets people use the regular internet without being tracked. It does this by bouncing communications around a lot of different computers, so rather than user A asking for a webpage from server Z, user A asks user B to ask user C to request the webpage (of course this is a massive simplification and is pretty inaccurate really, but it does give you are rough idea of what is happening). This means that any third party who is trying to spy on people will find it very difficult to tell who is actually viewing the webpage, or sending the email, or whatever it may be.

In addition to this enhanced privacy for web browsers, TOR also offers a way for people to host ‘hidden services’. A TOR hidden service is  a website or app of some kind whose location is hidden in exactly the same way that the true location or identity of web browsers is hidden by TOR in the example above. These hidden services can only be accessed by other TOR users – not by regular search engines or regular internet users. You can recognize them by their address – it will end in .onion and is often composed of a seemingly random string of characters. Once you have TOR installed on your computer you can visit these hidden services, which include the infamous dark markets where bitcoin, drugs and hacked credit card details are ubiquitous, in exactly the same way that you would access a regular website.

Installing TOR on your computer is incredibly simple. It is no different from installing any other piece of software. It is also very easy to use – when you open TOR you will see that it is just a web browser which you use exactly the same way as you would any other web browser. In fact, it is based on Firefox so if you have ever used that browser you will find it to be very familiar indeed. For those in need of more rigorous privacy and security there is also a TOR operating system called TAILS (The Amnesiac Incogneto Live System) which you can run from a USB stick, but for most people the browser is sufficient.

You can download the TOR browser here.

Using a VPN with Tor

Virtual Private Networks or VPNs are another kind of privacy software which masks your IP address (hiding who you are) but do not allow you to access hidden deep web sites.

Some users make use of a VPN in addition to Tor, in order to hide the fact that they are using Tor. This is not necessary, but some people just want that extra level of privacy. I recommend IPVanish if you’re looking for a VPN that works well with Tor and provides an excellent service for a fair price.