When you think of the internet, you think of google, you think of the millions of
results that they find for you in a matter of seconds. For example, if you google the
letter ‘a’, google will return about 25,270,000,000 results (0.35 seconds). The
internet is however often compared to an iceberg, where it looks big and is even
bigger below the surface. It is a place where an estimated 96% of content is not even
accessible from search engines such as Google. (Nohe, 2017)
This raises the question of what makes up this 96% of the internet, known as the
deep web. The first thought that comes to mind is all the illegal activities such as
drug trafficking and assassinations all being powered by cryptocurrencies. Despite
fears that this could be what takes up 96% of the internet, this is only a fraction of
what the deep web is. This black-market sub-section is what is known as the dark
web.
The deep web is a lot less scary of a place and is a lot more boring. Mainly consisting
of databases with private information, they are simply web pages that are not
indexed anywhere on the web. They are therefore not picked up by search engine’s
web crawlers. These search engines can only access web pages that are linked by
other web pages, this creates an invisible boundary between these web pages and
the rest of the internet. (Wright, 2009)
The deep web is full of sensitive information that would just make personal data
easily available to everyone. Imagine if someone could simply Google your name,
then your bank details and PPS number are delivered to them. Imagine they could
even access your online banking account, as any page that requires a log in is also
part of the deep web. (Wright, 2009)
The dark web, nonetheless, is the scary place that is rummaging with illegal
activities. These pages are not indexed by search engines since their purpose is to
stay as hidden and untraceable as possible (Greenberg, 2014) .The boundary to
access it is simply a proxy-type network that anyone can use to access, but, the
question is whether you’d want to access this place?
The two terms are mixed-up constantly and their content could not be more
different. However, what they do have in common is they are separated from what
most of us would consider the internet to be, which is what we can find on Google.
Bibliography
Greenberg, A., 2014. HACKER LEXICON: WHAT IS THE DARK WEB?. [Online]
Available at: https://www.wired.com/2014/11/hacker-lexicon-whats-dark-web/
[Accessed 17 February 2019].
Nohe, P., 2017. What is the Dark Web?. [Online]
Available at: https://www.thesslstore.com/blog/what-is-the-dark-web/
[Accessed 17 February 2019].
Wright, A., 2009. Exploring a ‘Deep Web’ That Google Can’t Grasp. [Online]
Available at:
[Accessed 17 February 2019].
Beyond The Border 