Candle is a lightweight, open-source dark web search engine with basic search functionality and high speed. Yes, both platforms have official .onion versions accessible via Tor. Due to law enforcement takedowns and security reasons, .onion addresses are frequently rotated. There are many places in the world where access to international news sources is blocked.
It provides an .onion URL and an interface for you to manage your Tor site easily. It also boasts that no personal information is required to use the service, and payment can be made with cryptocurrency. Keybase also offers extremely user-friendly secure chat and file-sharing services through its app.
Common Scams On Dark Web Marketplaces
Install Norton VPN to encrypt your internet connection and help protect the data you share online. It delivers an uncensored search experience, granting users access to a diverse array of information while effectively excluding illegal content. The website was investigated by a German police task force with cooperation from Europol and international law enforcement agencies.
The New York Times — Globally Recognized News Coverage
Its free plan comes with up to 1 GB of storage, 150 messages per day, and 1 email address. ProPublica has a clearnet site, but its dark web version won’t see your IP address, so you get better privacy. You can also use its .onion link via the Tor network to access the site in restrictive countries, where it might be unavailable.
The New York Times
Recon is used to find information about darknet vendor profiles and monitor their activity. Haystak has a free version but also offers a premium version with advanced features and deeper indexing. DuckDuckGo offers a .onion version with privacy-first results from both surface and dark web. mark it means it has been verified as a scam service and it should be avoided. Starting with ProPrivacy and now Proton, Douglas has worked for many years as a technology writer. During this time, he has established himself as a thought leader specializing in online privacy.|Nowadays, many people use the Tor browser to surf the public internet and navigate the deeper parts anonymously. The system is designed to provide enhanced security and privacy features. Its key features include kernel hardening, application firewall, package security, filesystem encryption, meta-proxy encryption, and binary integrity. Another essential security feature is that all incoming and outgoing data from the app is encrypted, including any private and public keys involved. Some markets are relatively short-lived (thanks to law enforcement), but others are notorious enough that they survive, for instance, Silk Road, AlphaBay, and Hansa.|SecureDrop is software platform that NGOs and media organizations can install to accept leaked information from whistleblowers safely. It also comes with a functionality that allows journalists to communicate with their source(s) in a private manner. Many news sites use SecureDrop, such as The Washington Post, ProPublica, and The Guardian. TorLinks is a great alternative to The Hidden Wiki and provides a list of .onion websites across various categories. Sure, there’s some overlap between the two, but the list of sites on TorLinks is widely different.|So don’t be surprised if you encounter different versions that claim to be genuine, and be very careful. This is an estimated reading time to let you know how long it will take you to read all the content on this particular PrivacySavvy.com page. However, it has a sneak peek, easy guide steps, and/or a quick list providing quick in-page navigations and easily-found answers if desired. Radar Rundown Free firewall software allow privacy ethusuiasts to secure their network and block mal… We recommend installing a premium antivirus program for optimal protection against malware infections.}
A six-month VIP subscription on the site, which gave users unlimited access to child porn videos, reportedly cost 0.03 Bitcoins — about $350. SecureDrop is designed explicitly for journalists trying to preserve the privacy of their sources. Its anonymous nature enables users to create and submit encrypted documents, chat securely, and receive private responses from journalists. Ahmia also discourages access to illegal content and promotes safer internet practices. Confidential government files and pages tied to unlawful trafficking often get filtered out. While many dark websites appear sketchy, The New York Times is an exception.
- In addition, you can connect your Keybase account with X, GitHub, or Reddit to let people easily trust that they are talking to the actual person.
- These search engines work best if you already know what site you’re looking for, not for general browsing.
- Launched in 2023, STYX focuses on financial crime, providing stolen credit card data, hacked bank accounts and access to various cryptocurrency laundering tools.
- Scroll on to learn more about dark web links (also called Tor links or onion sites), get the right links for some of the best Tor sites, and find out how to visit them safely.
- However, it’s much harder to get at the people who are doing the uploading and downloading.
- With the onion browser, you can access ordinary HTTPS websites on the web.
Navigating Tor Safely For Adult Content
For safer browsing, it is highly recommended to also use a VPN and antivirus software. If you know the right websites, you can easily access a tremendous amount of information, including research articles, news stories, and more. The dark web is a part of the internet that you only step into with a specific tool (Tor, more on this later in the article). Though people usually think of dark websites as the wrong online place, that’s not the complete truth.

September’s Top VPN Discounts
Following best practices for online anonymity helps, but staying cautious is essential since no method is completely foolproof. It also offers a comprehensive list of marketplaces, exchanges, and websites linked to fraudulent activities, helping you stay informed. Darknet websites are one thing, but darknet markets involve a whole category of websites that may get banned by search engines. If all you need is a discussion to satisfy your curiosities, you have nowhere to turn to.
Topic: Child Porn
The last item on our dark web websites list is Google Feud or rather its evil twin. For those of you unfamiliar with this, G-Feud is a clear web game where you have to guess the answers to some random or topic-related search strings. For instance, if you choose a topic (e.g. food), G-Feud will give you a string such as “can I eat…? The anonymous group behind Tunnels alleged that the materials were produced while exploring the forbidden tunnels, built underneath some of the most prestigious American Universities.
However, The Wayback Machine allows website owners to block their sites from being archived, while archive.today does not. ProPublica has a reputation for unwavering investigative journalism. In 2021, they showed how tax rates benefit the rich, and they relied on stolen or leaked IRS documents to do so. In addition to the surface web, ProPublica also hosts their site on the dark web, because they want to make sure that everyone can access their reporting.

The second category consists of data stores, which specialize in stolen information. Child sexual abuse material is rampant online, despite considerable efforts by big tech companies and governments to curb it. And according to reports, it has only become more prevalent during the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of the operation, German authorities intervened on 96 occasions to safeguard children.
ProtonMail — Free & Secure Email Services
Despite growing crackdowns from law enforcement agencies, the dark web remains a hotbed of criminal activity, offering everything from drugs to stolen data. Such operations are facilitated by cybercrime and transnational organised crime treaties which address child sex abuse material and the trafficking of women and children. Forum members distribute media, support each other and exchange tips to avoid police detection and scams targeting them.
Pissmail is the service for you, offering an onion based web service accessible via Tor browser. They offer user generated reviews of forums and darknet markets, alongside breaking stories and news from the Tor-sphere. Staying safe on the dark web requires even more vigilance than the public internet. Scammers and criminals are lurking everywhere to take advantage of the unwary. Follow the pointers below to avoid becoming a victim if accessing the dark web. This is a blog with cybersecurity tips created by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a popular non-profit that specializes in digital privacy.

It’s something built into the password management services offered by Apple and Google as well, so you don’t need to trawl through data leaks manually yourself. Hackers spend a lot of time on the dark web, and it’s not too difficult to get access to hacking tools and data leaks in this part of the internet. However, it’s much harder to get at the people who are doing the uploading and downloading.

What Are Tor Onion Services?
With the onion browser, you can access ordinary HTTPS websites on the web. This is a great way to improve your privacy because Tor isolates each website you visit, meaning third-party trackers and ISPs can’t reveal your identity. The Dark Web is the part of the deep web that is not indexed by search engines, like Google or Bing. For this reason, you cannot browse through these sites using your default search engine.
The dark web is used by journalists, whistleblowers, and political activists who need the protections that it offers. Anything you need to do that has to be off the books to some extent, for noble or ignoble reasons, can be done on the dark web. The dark web comes with its own set of tools and services, including web browsers and search engines (which I’ll get on to in a moment). Part of what makes the dark web the dark web is that you can’t access it through your normal web browser, nor can you look something up on it via a Google search. Regular search engines like Google use “crawlers” to index their pages, following links from known web addresses to index other linked pages. The dark web also uses a different protocol that a regular browser doesn’t follow.