You thought you knew the Internet. But sites such as Facebook,
Amazon, and Instagram are just the surface. There’s a whole other world
out there: the Deep Web.
It’s a place where online information is password protected, trapped
behind paywalls, or requires special software to access—and it’s
massive. By some estimates, it is 500 times larger than the surface Web
that most people search every day. Yet it’s almost completely out of
sight. According to a study published in Nature, Google indexes no more
than 16 percent of the surface Web and misses all of the Deep Web. Any
given search turns up just 0.03 percent of the information that exists
online (one in 3,000 pages). It’s like fishing in the top two feet of
the ocean—you miss the virtual Mariana Trench below.
Much of the Deep Web’s unindexed material lies in mundane databases
such as LexisNexis or the rolls of the U.S. Patent Office. But like a
Russian matryoshka doll, the Deep Web contains a further hidden world, a
smaller but significant community where malicious actors unite in
common purpose for ill. Welcome to the Dark Web, sometimes called the
Darknet, a vast digital underground where hackers, gangsters,
terrorists, and pedophiles come to ply their trade. What follows is but a
cursory sampling of the goods and services available from within the
darkest recesses of the Internet.
Things You Can Buy
1. Drugs
Individual or dealer-level quantities of illicit and prescription
drugs of every type are available in the digital underground. The Silk
Road, the now-shuttered drug superstore, did $200 million of business in
28 months.
2. Counterfeit Currency
Fake money varies widely in quality and cost, but euros, pounds, and
yen are all available. Six hundred dollars gets you $2,500 in counterfeit U.S. notes, promised to pass the typical pen and ultraviolet-light tests.
3. Forged Papers
Passports, driver’s licenses, citizenship papers, fake IDs, college
diplomas, immigration documents, and even diplomatic ID cards are
available on illicit marketplaces such as Onion Identity Services. A
U.S. driver’s license costs approximately $200, while passports from the
U.S. or U.K. sell for a few thousand bucks.
4. Firearms, Ammunition, and Explosives
Weapons such as handguns and C4 explosives are procurable on the Dark
Web. Vendors ship their products in specially shielded packages to
avoid x-rays or send weapons components hidden in toys, musical
instruments, or electronics.
5. Hitmen
Service providers—including a firm named for the H.P. Lovecraft
monster C’thulhu—advertise “permanent solutions to common problems.” For
everything from private grudges to political assassinations, these
hired guns accept bitcoin as payment and provide photographic proof of
the deed.
6. Human Organs
In the darker corners of the Dark Web, a vibrant and gruesome black market for live organs thrives. Kidneys may fetch $200,000, hearts $120,000, livers $150,000, and a pair of eyeballs $1,500.
Things That Make Internet Crime Work
1. Cryptocurrency
Digital cash, such as bitcoin
and darkcoin, and the payment system Liberty Reserve provide a
convenient system for users to spend money online while keeping their
real-world identities hidden.
2. Bulletproof Web-hosting Services
Some Web hosts in places such as Russia or Ukraine welcome all
content, make no attempts to learn their customers’ true identities,
accept anonymous payments in bitcoin, and routinely ignore subpoena
requests from law enforcement.
3. Cloud Computing
By hosting their criminal malware with reputable firms, hackers are
much less likely to see their traffic blocked by security systems. A
recent study suggested that 16 percent of the world’s malware and
cyberattack distribution channels originated in the Amazon Cloud.
4. Crimeware
Less skilled criminals can buy all the tools they need to identify
system vulnerabilities, commit identity theft, compromise servers, and
steal data. It was a hacker with just such a tool kit who invaded
Target’s point-of-sale system in 2013.
5. Hackers For Hire
Organized cybercrime syndicates outsource hackers-for-hire. China's
Hidden Lynx group boasts up to 100 professional cyberthieves, some of
whom are known to have penetrated systems at Google, Adobe, and Lockheed
Martin.
6. Multilingual Crime Call Centers
Employees will play any duplicitous role you would like, such as
providing job and educational references, initiating wire transfers, and
unblocking hacked accounts. Calls cost around $10.
How to Access the Dark Web’s Wares
Anonymizing Browser
Tor—short for The Onion Router—is one of several software programs
that provide a gateway to the Dark Web. Tor reroutes signals across
6,000 servers to hide a page request’s origin, making clicks on illicit
material nearly impossible for law enforcement to trace. It uses secret
pages with .onion suffixes—rather than .com—which are only accessible
with a Tor browser.
Secret Search Engines
In mid-2014, a hacker created Grams, the Dark Web’s first distributed
search engine. Grams allows would-be criminals to search for drugs,
guns, and stolen bank accounts across multiple hidden sites. It even
includes an "I’m Feeling Lucky" button and targeted ads where drug
dealers compete for clicks.
Criminal Wikis
Carefully organized wikis list hidden sites by category, such as
Hacks, Markets, Viruses, and Drugs. Descriptions of each link help
curious newcomers find their desired illicit items.
Hidden Chatrooms
Just as in the real world, online criminals looking to obtain the
most felonious material must be vouched for before they can transact. A
network of invitation-only chatrooms and forums, hidden behind unlisted
alphanumeric Web addresses, provides access to the most criminal of
circles.
This article was adapted from Marc Goodman’s book Future Crimes, which was published in February. It originally appeared in the April 2015 issue of Popular Science,
under
the title "The Dark Web Revealed.” All text © 2015 Marc Goodman,
published by arrangement with Doubleday, an imprint of The Knopf
Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.
