We explain how the dark web actually works and how you can access it safely.

Juan

Fedora

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Proton offers an onion dark web version of our website so that people in some of the most repressive parts of the world can access our services. We explain what the dark web is, how you can access it, and what sites you might find useful on it.

What is the dark web? The good and bad of the internet’s most private corner

<p>thx for sharing , today i have learned something</p>


<h1>The Dark Web: A Closer Look</h1>
<p>The dark web, often shrouded in myths, offers both potential threats and benefits. It’s much like the regular World Wide Web we’re all familiar with, except that the dark web provides much greater privacy.</p>
<h2>Understanding the Dark Web</h2>
<p>The dark web isn’t called “dark” because it’s inherently bad; it’s called dark because it provides privacy (that can be used for good and ill). It can be abused by criminals to scam people, sell drugs, host illegal content, and more. But it also provides a refuge from overbearing government surveillance and the ubiquitous corporate capitalism that tracks your every move online.</p>
<h3>What is the dark web?</h3>
<p>The internet can be divided into three parts:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>The clear web:</strong> Also known as the “surface web”, the clear web is the World Wide Web we’re all familiar with.</li>
<li><strong>The deep web:</strong> The deep web, also known as the “invisible web”, is all internet content that’s not indexed by search engines. It is much larger than the clear web.</li>
<li><strong>The dark web:</strong> The dark web, also called the “hidden web,” is a small portion of the deep web. It is made up of websites and other online resources that can only be accessed using special software, configurations, or authorization.</li>
</ol>
<h4>Tor Onion Services</h4>
<p><a href="https://www.torproject.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Tor Onion Services</a> are the most well-known and popular dark web. It provides a high level of true anonymity when using the clear web.</p>
<h4>I2P</h4>
<p><a href="https://geti2p.net/en/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">I2P</a> is designed to improve upon Tor’s onion routing system. It bundles its data packets together into “cloves” before sending them through its network as messages rather than sending them one by one as Tor does.</p>
<h4>Freenet</h4>
<p><a href="https://freenetproject.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Freenet</a> is a fully distributed, peer-to-peer anonymous publishing network that offers secure data storage. When you join the Freenet network, you agree to share a percentage of your local disk space.</p>
<h3>How to access the dark web</h3>
<p>To access the dark web, you need special tools that can vary depending on which dark web you want to use. The usual way to access Tor Onion Services is by using <a href="https://www.torproject.org/download/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Tor Browser</a> for Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android.</p>
<h3>What’s on the dark web?</h3>
<p>The illicit uses of the dark web are well documented: assassination services, ecommerce sites for buying guns and drugs, and so on. However, there are plenty of legitimate reasons to use the dark web. You can read ProPublica or The New York Times, check your email in Proton Mail, or browse your Facebook wall. All of these mainstream websites offer dark web access because of the privacy and freedom of information advantages it offers.</p>
<h2>The Importance of the Dark Web</h2>
<p>So yes, bad stuff happens on the dark web, but it’s also a vital privacy tool. As governments work to weaken encryption with backdoors and corporations gain greater access to everything we do, privacy and security technologies like those used to create dark webs must be vigorously defended. And that starts with understanding them beyond sensational headlines.</p>
