dark web

The dark web refers to a collection of websites that exist on an encrypted network and cannot be found by using traditional search engines or visited by using traditional browsers. Almost all sites on the dark web hide their identity using the Tor encryption tool.

The dark web forms a small part of the deep web, the part of the Web not indexed by web search engines. Although sometimes the term deep web is mistakenly used to refer to the dark web, the dark web is typically associated with hackers, online predators, pornography, and other types of sinister and illegal behaviors.

The content on the dark web actually exists on what's called darknets. The darknets rely on small, friend-to-friend or peer-to-peer networking, as well as large popular networks operated by public organizations and individuals. Users of the dark web refer to the regular web as Clearnet due to its unencrypted nature.

Historical perspective: In 2018 the television show "48 Hours" exposed the alarming world of murder-for-hire on the mysterious dark web and uncovered an international crime organization that ultimately led to arrests in four separate cases of people who were allegedly willing to pay to have someone killed.