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I've had multiple friends recently ask a question about what the dark web is. I thought I'd make a post explaining it and as best I can, and hopefully clear up some popular misconceptions about it.
The dark web is an anonymizing network. I don't fully understand the backend of how it does this, but it makes servers anonymous. So, you can run a dark web server and anybody can view your site, but theoretically nobody will be able to find where the actual server is, including the FBI or CIA, etc. ("Theoretically" is an important word there-- Authorities will still try to find the servers and they sometimes succeed.)
Basically, you can run a website, but nobody will be able to find you-- Not just the visitors, but the servers themselves are anonymous. The "dark" part of the "dark web" is the anonymity.
This was originally intended for and still used by journalists and whistleblowers, particularly those working in countries where free speech and free press aren't really a thing (and I've read that it's partly funded by the U.S. government for this reason). My understanding is that the dark web is actually more popular in countries that persecute political dissidents, but it has also been used by whistleblowers against the U.S. government itself, like Edward Snowden.
So, the dark web is the anonymized web. The web that we're more accustomed to is called the "clearweb".
By the very nature of its anonymity, the dark web has attracted some bad actors. People can create a dark web server to host horrible things and run illegal businesses. This also occurs on the clearweb, possibly moreso, but if you want to have a website for your hit man service or your drug ring, sell stolen credit card numbers or social security numbers, or possibly something far worse that's unspeakable, you'll want to use the dark web. Or Squarespace, if podcast ads are to be believed.
One famous dark web site was called "The Silk Road", and was finally shut down by police and its owner arrested.
That said, the majority of these illegal websites are scams. (Or so I've been told-- I don't go to those sites, naturally.) If you attempt to hire an assassin on the dark web, more than likely they'll just take your money and do nothing.
You're not really going to accidentally run into these sites. The bad reputation of the dark web is mostly unfounded. That horrible stuff is there, but you have to actively look for it.
The content that the dark web is most known for (that I won't state) is actually very rare, or at least that's my understanding. The majority of dark web sites explicity state that they don't want it on their servers and will result in an instant ban. They don't want that kind of attention from the FBI. And there are occasional news stories about dark web hackers that hack the servers of those sites that do exist-- Even the people on the dark web hate that stuff.
Essentially, dark web sites are like regular websites. They still use HTML and CSS, they can use JavaScript, but it's probably not a great idea to enable JS on dark web sites, and they're backed by servers that have the same kind of backend code and databases as any other website.
One major difference is that the anonymizing network is really slow, and another major difference is the obvious lack of funding that goes into any particular website because there's not much demand from U.S. citizens for the dark web. As a result, the dark web basically looks and feels like 1995.
Yes, but not that many, and navigating the dark web isn't that easy. It turns out that the vast majority of websites on the dark web are boring. The social media sites are largely ghost towns and most links don't work. If you want to see what interesting things are on the dark web, your best bet is to watch someone on YouTube browse the dark web.
The thing is, those really fascinating conspiracy theories and cults aren't actually illegal in the U.S., so, you'll find those on the clear web much more easily.
You can't use a regular browser to visit a darkweb site. You have to install special software to connect to the anonymizing network.
There are three darknets that I know of-- Tor, Freenet, and I2P.
Not in the US, but it's illegal to visit certain websites. (That's actually true for the clearweb, too.)
Nah. Unless you have a specific reason to be there, there's nothing to do there. And I don't want to spend any time there because, well, although I know the reputation of the dark web is largely undeserved, I still can't shake that there are horrible things there, and I don't want to come across it by accident, as unlikely as it may be. (The websites that I've been to myself are mostly websites that I've already seen on YouTube.)
Nope, not at all. It's probably safer than going to an unknown site on the clearweb, actually. There are a lot of creepypastas online about people that visited the dark web and ended up being stalked, but those are pure fiction. The entire point of the dark web is anonymity-- That's what "dark" means. The people on the dark web don't know who you are any more than you know who they are. Now, you definitely do not want to give out your home address or credit card number, but visiting a site is by and large perfectly safe.
Like the creepypastas, the various layers of the dark web are complete fiction. There's no such thing as "Marianas' Web." The dark web is just an anonymizing network-- Nothing more.
I guess it depends on what you mean by "snuff film." If you simply mean people being murdered as a form of entertainment, probably. Those are also on the clearweb, too. The people that make those films are, of course, put into prison, but sharing and viewing those videos are perfectly legal, as long as you had nothing to do with the production of it.
If, on the other hand, you mean companies that make murder videos for profit, not that I know of.
One persistent rumor is something called a "red room". I won't describe what that is here, but it would be essentially impossible to do any kind of livestreaming over an anonymizing network, and no known footage of a red room is known to exist.
YouTube. Mostly. I don't spend any time on the dark web, for reasons I already mentioned. I've been there, but, that's about it.
When most people say "deep web", they often use the term synonymously with "dark web", but the deep web is actually something different. "Deep web" is a term coined by someone at Google to describe all information on the internet that's not indexed by search engines. So, paywalled websites, your email and Facebook messages, basically anything that's not public information, plus websites that simply request not to be crawled by search engines, are deep web.
Tiny. The deep web is huge. The dark web is miniscule, contrary to popular belief.
I was initially interested in the dark web because I saw the rising tide of censorship, not just from social media platforms but from domain registrars and hosting services. That's exactly why the dark web exists. But, I know enough about it and other technologies now that I know that there are better alternatives. If the U.S. government starts to censor speech as heavily as Twitter and Facebook, then there may not be any better alternatives, but that's unlikely to happen too soon.