Going Dark: The Internet Behind The Internet

NPR ^ | May 25, 2014

[Mean Daddy]

The average computer user with an Internet connection has access to an amazing wealth of information. But there's also an entire world that's invisible to your standard Web browser.

These parts of the Internet are known as the Deep Web. The tools to get to there are just a few clicks away, and more and more people who want to browse the Web anonymously are signing on.

Fans of the series House of Cards might recall the Deep Web being worked into the plot of latest season. The character Lucas, a newspaper editor who was trying find a hacker, gets a little crash course from one of his reporters:

"Ninety-six percent of the Internet isn't accessible through standard search engines. Most of it's useless but it's where you go to find anything and everything: child porn, Bitcoin laundry, narcotics, hackers for hire ..."

[Lurker]

You believe everything the media tells you?

[Bikkuri]

I used TOR to skip past my work’s security firewall (FR was blocked) to read FR when I had free time. Slipped right through ;^)

[Bikkuri]

OT, but I FINALLY found a perfect music player (for Linux).. Qmmp... looks and feels like WinAmp (even uses WinAmp skins).. ..no skips since it goes straight through ALSA (doesn’t go through Pulse) :) (sound is excellent ;^))

[The Antiyuppie]

Note that it IS possible to detect that you are using such a program. Depending on how large your employer is, what their resources are, and how interested they are, there are other ways of finding out what you are up to (keyboard capture, screen monitoring, etc).

[MaxMax]

I almost tried ToR and found virus after virus, and that was before I even installed
the app to use it. Access through ToR is trapped with all types of viruses and apps that
want access permissions to your computer. And it's undetectable? That's not even funny.

[Bikkuri]

Public School (Japan)... No corporate secrets they have to worry about ;^)
Not even sure Japan knows what TOR is yet.

[rarestia]

By what measure are you defining security, Shadow? TOR is much more secure with regards to obfuscation than unencrypted Internet traffic. Certainly you’re better off with securing transactions via SSL/TLS, but if you want to be “anonymous,” TOR is the way to go. I meant secure inasmuch as anonymous. I think it’s pretty well understood that TOR is not for the meek or stupid.

[ShadowAce]

Just about anyone can operate an exit node on the TOR network. If this network exists, and the gov't hasn't shut it down, then you know they are running a ton of exit nodes.

When one has control over an exit node, one can sniff packets, compare them to other packets on other nodes you control, and put together a reasonable idea of what is going on. While TOR *may* be safe from individuals, it most certainly is not safe from the US.

[rarestia]

Ah, okay. I wasn’t thinking from that angle. I run my own exit nodes along with several very close techie friends, so we know our data routes. You are correct, however, if the government runs an exit node that’s masquerading as “secure,” they can intercept the data. If it’s encrypted, however, they’re SOL without the private keys or at least an asymmetric key or hash.