about a year ago I stumbled a post somewhere that talked about a hidden or underground internet. My computer crashed a while back and I lost the directions on how to get there. Can anybody help me out and tell me how I can get back there?
Well, I know but without us being able to do the secret handshake I’m afraid that I can’t tell you.
I’d like to get there too. What color tube shall I look for?
Camouflage.
Remember, when they ask you what the password is, there is no password.
This *is *the underground Internet. The mainstream one is nothing but pictures of kittens and monster trucks.
There is very little that is really “hidden” unless it is stuff behind various company firewalls that is nunya bidness.
There are places that require a few hoops to jump through to access like
Contact DelFlorio’s Dry Cleaning(a division of the Hidalgo Trading Company) and ask to speak to a Mr. Sabastian Tombs. Just tell him that you know what the Bishop said to the Actress, and hang up without waiting for a response. You will be contacted with further instruction the following Tuesday by a courier pigeon carrying a telegraph. Feed the pigeon, tie a green string to the left leg, and let it go.
Wait by the telephone. if you don’t have a home phone, get one installed ASAP! If you answer the phone on the second ring every single time for four days, you’re in.
The first rule of the Underground Internet…
Or you could look up freenet or darknet and go from there…
Jokes aside, the OP is referring to the Deep Web. Here are a couple of articles discussing search techniques. I have no knowledge of or opinon on the validity of anything in them.
“Deep web” is a term that refers to web content that is not indexable by search engines. It is neither hidden or underground.
The OP is so hopelessly vague that it is not possible to determine precisely what he is talking about. He could be talking about Freenet, Tor, AlterNIC domains, or something that isn’t actually “web” at all, like skeevy Usenet groups or that one Gopher server with the goat pr0n.
My hunch is he’s either referring to .torrent sites or said skeevy Usenet sites that offer pirate material. I could see someone configuring his computer to access those and calling it the “underground internet”.
Just a guess though.
There are other vectors for illegality, not web, but certainly internet, like irc channels that, given enough trust, allow access to ftp sites that contain all sorts of skullduggery - that was the “scene” when it came to movie and music piracy, although it has changed a lot. And then there are the various tendrils of criminal ISPs, like the diaspora of the Russian Business Network
OP, look here.
Nevertheless, it is an entirely reasonable inference that this is what the OP (who has a join date of 2007, so not a stranger here) was asking about. I do not see the need for snark, or the assumption that he is trying to do something illegal or skeevy, just because he did not use exactly the same metaphor that you would.
It is hidden inasmuch as its content is not indexed by regular search engines such as Google or Bing. However, this link (also given by Tom Tildrum, who was actually trying to be helpful) lists several ways that its content can be searched and accessed.
Alternatively, one could google “hidden web search engine”. Google knows what it means, even if you don’t.
Just replace “www” with “mmm”.
Internet2 Network is primarily accessible through Universities and gov computers. We have a gateway up at work, but I don’t have access myself.
Freenet is probably the closest publicly-accessible thing to what you’re thinking of. It rides on top of the regular Internet but it’s “hidden” in the sense that that it’s a decentralized, encrypted network. In theory, you should be able to remain anonymous to everyone on Freenet, and you can only access Freenet with special (free) software. And nobody should be able to block anything on the network, but the more popular content will be faster to retrieve because it’ll be more widely mirrored.
Freenet is used for everything from political rants to child porn.
There is also I2P, which I believe is similar but am unfamiliar with, and Tor, which tries to mask your identity to websites on the regular World Wide Web.
This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue tube - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red tube - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.