ACCESSING THE INVISIBLE WEB: ISSUES AND CONCERNS

Abstract

Timely and secured access to reliable information on the web is a key to the advancement of knowledge in all fields of endeavour. The World Wide Web has, since the emergence of the internet in the 1960s, served as the bedrock for real-time information access and retrieval. Interestingly, only about 4% of internet resources are available easily and accessed through conventional search engines. The remaining 96% are found in the inner layers of the web known as the deep web and dark web or collectively known as the invisible web. Efficient access to resources of the internet at the sub-surface levels requires the use of specialized anonymized tools such as The Onion Router (Tor) browser but this is not without its issues and other concerns. This paper examines issues and concerns inherent in the deep and dark web as well as the potential measures towards the safe and convenient usage of these invisible web domains.

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FUW Trends in Science & Technology Journal, www.ftstjournal.com
e-ISSN: 24085162; p-ISSN: 20485170; August, 2021: Vol. 6 No. 2 pp. 607 – 611
607
ACCESSING THE INVISIBLE WEB: ISSUES AND CONCERNS
Odey John A.* and Okoro Anthony T.
Department of Computer Science, University of Calabar, Cross-River State, Nigeria
*Corresponding author: johnodey@unical.edu.ng
Received: May 23, 2021 Accepted: July 14, 2021
Abstract: Timely and secured access to reliable information on the web is a key to the advancement of knowledge in all
fields of endeavour. The World Wide Web has, since the emergence of the internet in the 1960s, served as the
bedrock for real-time information access and retrieval. Interestingly, only about 4% of internet resources are
available easily and accessed through conventional search engines. The remaining 96% are found in the inner
layers of the web known as the deep web and dark web or collectively known as the invisible web. Efficient access
to resources of the internet at the sub-surface levels requires the use of specialized anonymized tools such as The
Onion Router (Tor) browser but this is not without its issues and other concerns. This paper examines issues and
concerns inherent in the deep and dark web as well as the potential measures towards the safe and convenient
usage of these invisible web domains.
Keywords: Invisible web, deep web, dark web, Tor network
Introduction
The World Wide Web (www) is an online information space
that has grown over the years to provide resources and easy
means of communication among users. It was created by Sir
Tim Berners-Lee in 1989 and made public in 1991 as a
platform for billions of internet users to interact and
seamlessly share resources across the board (Crawley, 2019).
The www is classified into the surface web, deep web, and
dark web with the surface web being the most common area
of the web that is publicly accessible by users through
conventional search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing
(Bedi et al., 2020; HackerNoon, 2018). The ability to access a
greater percentage of internet resources on the surface web
depends on the techniques used by search engine crawlers to
extract information on the World Wide Web (Bedi et al.,
2020).
The invisible web is not indexed by regular search engines.
The contents are huge and sit beyond the surface web, which
for various technical reasons are not indexed by search
engines (Chertoff & Simon, 2015; Weimann, 2015). The dark
web is a portion of the deep web that relies on darknets (a
network that permits communication only with trusted peers)
for security (Ciancaglini et al., 2015). It is intentionally
hidden and only accessible through specialized web browsers
such as the Tor (The onion routers) browser, Tails OS, I2P
(Invisible Internet Project), Freenet, and Subgraph Operating
System (Subgraph OS) (Steve, 2016). Figs. 1 and 2 depict the
structure and basic activities on the surface web, deep web,
and dark web, respectively.
Research has shown that while the surface web provides users
with information from web pages that are indexable by search
engines, over 96% of the internet content is invisible on
conventional search engines but is domiciled in the deep web.
In other words, what most computer and internet users know
and access is information indexed and displayed on
conventional search engines, which constitutes a mere 4% of
the internet’s available resources. Incidentally, information on
the deep web is stored in databases and cannot be indexed by
these conventional search engines thus making it practically
impossible for users to access this information (Digital.com,
2018). This is because search engines depend on the web’s
linkages to identify contents on the Web (Bergman, 2001).
Fig. 1: Structure of the World Wide Web (adapted from
(Ciancaglini et al., 2015; Parker et al., 2017)
Fig. 2: Parts of the web (Hacker Combat, 2017)
Polarization and unregulated transactions of resources on
these internet domains tend to portray the deep web and
specifically the dark web as a habitat for all web-related
illegal activities such as drug deals, hacking, conspiracies, etc.
(HackerNoon, 2018). It is also worthy of note that beyond the
surface web, internet users see the dark web as a haven for
free speech and users seeking extreme privacy especially
among those working within strict government regulations
like journalists, military, law enforcement agencies, human
right activists, and political dissidents (Hadjimatheou, 2017;
Supported by

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Lightfoot, 2017). With the advantage of being unregulated
and no compulsion to satisfy government or institutional
standards, many use the dark web as a testbed for
experimentation of innovations; more like a trial-and-error,
which if successful such ideas are often transferred to the
surface web (Thomaz et al., 2020). This is to say, there exist a
plethora of resources for the good and bad intentions of a user
on the deep web. Thus, the use of the internet beyond the
surface web raises security concerns for both users and the
contents on the internet. Without proper security measures and
consideration, internet surfing beyond the surface web can be
dangerous and fatal. This paper is therefore aimed at
addressing issues and concerns inherent in the deep and dark
web.
Problem Definition
The invisible web is a web of anonymity where users’
identities and locations are protected by encryption
technologies routing user’s data through many servers and
peer to peer networks across the globe. Is it illegal to go on
the invisible web? Simply put, No, it is not illegal to access
the deep and dark web. In fact, some uses are perfectly legal
and support the value of the “dark web” (Kaspersky 2021). On
the invisible web, users can seek out clear benefits from its
use:
 User privacy and anonymity considerations
 Services and web locations cannot be traced
 A platform to mitigate illegal activities by law
enforcement agencies.
While privacy considerations and anonymity expectations are
paramount benefits and justifications for the deep web,
protecting whistle-blowers, privacy advocates, and political
dissidents should not come at the expense of empowering
illegal activities injurious to the norms of the societies like
arms trafficking, dangerous literatures, child abusers, human
trafficking, and sales of illicit drug. Therein lies the challenge:
to devise approaches that walk the fine line of protecting
liberal principles in an age of information control while
identifying and eradicating the most insidious activities on the
dark web. When viewed through this lens, the dark web’s
legality is based on how you as a user engage with it
(Kaspersky 2021). Hence the wins in addressing the issues
and concerns of the invisible web will accelerate positive
innovations, freedom of information dissemination, and other
inherent salient benefits.
According to Michael Bergman (Bergman, 2001), who is
attributed as the originator of the terminology ‘deep web’,
searching the internet is akin to spreading a fishnet across the
surface of the ocean. There are chances that while many fishes
may be caught, a greater swarm will be missed. Similarly, a
greater percentage of internet resources are buried far down
on the deep web. The superfluity of these resources has
attracted several users to the domain. In this section, an in-
depth review of related literature on the trends and topical
issues including activities within each domain and security
measures is discussed. To begin with, is a summary of the
characteristics of the three web domains as presented by
Sheils (2020) in Table 1.
Table 1: Comparison of the surface web, deep web, and the dark web (Sheils, 2020)
The surface web
The deep web
The dark web
How to Access
Traditional search engine.
Requires password, encryption, or
specialty software like Tor.
Requires Tor Project or similar
to the view
Includes
All indexed web pages
All unindexed webpages
The subset of unindexed
webpages inside the deep web.
Size
Approximately 4.47 billion pages
Massive, likely 4-5X was larger than
the Surface web.
A subset of the Deep Web, but
unmeasurable in size.
Uses
Email, social media, video, legitimate
business websites, etc.
Usually used for legit purposes that
requires anonymity.
Sometimes used for illegal
activities.
Who uses it?
Anyone with an internet connection.
Whistleblowers, journalists, etc.
Hackers, sellers, and buyers of
illegal merchandise.
Can be browsed
anonymously?
No, nearly all activity can be seen by
your Internet Service Provider (ISP).
Usually, especially if you use a Virtual
Private Network (VPN) to access.
With precautions, yes.
There have been extensive researches in the past years on these
domains. The major focus has been to understand the various
operations that take place on the invisible web and development of
strategies to curb illegal activities that are found.
In 2012, The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the United
States of America carried out an investigation tagged "Operation
Torpedo" using network investigative technique (NIT) to unveil the
Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of at least twenty-five individuals
who visited child pornography websites on the dark web. NIT was
delivered to computers that accessed the illegal sites, allowing for
delayed notification to the targets for thirty days and within two
weeks, the FBI was able to collect the IP addresses of visitors to the
malicious sites (Vogt, 2017). Interest in the invisible web grew more
in October 2013 with the arrest of Ross William Ulbricht and
subsequent shutting of his marketplace called Silk Road by the FBI
(Nabki et al., 2017). Silk Road, launched in February 2011, was an
online marketplace for the trading of all sorts of contrabands,
particularly illegal drugs using Tor Browser for anonymity and
Bitcoins, a cryptographic currency for the method of payment
(Bojarski, 2015; Sui et al., 2015).
Similarly, in a raid called Operation Onymous in November 2014,
law enforcement agents successfully brought down Silk Road 2.0,
which sprung up immediately after the shutdown of Silk Road, in
addition to 27 other Dark Net drug market sites (Gingerich, 2014). In
2014, the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
(DARPA) launched a search engine known as memex to create a
search index that would assist in fighting potential human trafficking
and illegal operations carried out on the dark web. The application
works by scraping and indexing almost the entire internet resources
that are ignored by traditional search engines. It analyzes these
resources, identifying their pattern and relationships but yet maintains
anonymity through the concealment of the IP addresses of suspicious
connections (Vogt, 2017). Cyber and national security experts have
continued to develop frameworks including data mining tools that will
aid in the identification and monitoring of suspicious activities on the
dark web. One such investment is the development of an Automated
Tool for Onion Labeling (ATOL) system that crawls, analyzes, and
labels content thematically in the public Tor Hidden Service (HS)
ecosystem, then indexes the content from these onion sites into a
large-scale data repository, called LIGHTS that houses more than
100M pages. The system analyzes onion sites and labels them
thematically to identify malicious sites (Ghosh et al., 2017).
Apart from tracking and shutting of many illegal activities as profiled
above, studies have been carried out to understand the technological
innovations inherent in the invisible web. A study by the Trend Micro
Forward-Looking Threat Research Team using a robust deep web
analyzer (DeWA) was carried out to aid investigations into various
cybercrime activities on the dark web. For over two years, DeWA
tracked malicious online activities and explored new threats on the
deep web. Analysis of the data extracted by software showed that
most of the activities involved benign content, alongside illicit
activities which include illicit drug deals, child exploitation, bitcoin

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laundering services, assassination service advertisement, amongst
others. The authors posit that taking down marketplaces on the deep
web seems not to be a lasting solution in preventing illegal deals on
the dark web, as there continue to be a proliferation of online shops
and fora where these illicit deals still take place rather security
defenders need to keep monitoring these activities and curtailing it,
especially as the role of the deep web on the internet grows. The paper
concludes that anonymity in the Deep Web will continue to be a
major issue of discourse and of interest for both law enforcers and
Internet users who want to circumvent government surveillance and
intervention (Ciancaglini et al., 2015).
Technologically, the invisible web has continued to experience
advancements in terms of robustness, anonymity, and size. There is
now increasingly availability of crimeware, advanced
secure/anonymous web hosting services, and cryptocurrency/dark
wallet, not forgetting the contributions of ubiquitous computing,
distributed/cloud computing, mobile computing, and sensor networks
(Sui et al., 2015). It has created an enabling platform for applications
such as the directory of the U.S. Library of Congress (www.loc.gov),
FreeLunch.com, Census.gov, Copyright.gov, PubMed, Web of
Science, WWW Virtual Library, Directory of Open Access Journals,
FindLaw, and Wolfram Alpha, Westlaw and LexisNexis, Twitter,
Facebook, and Instant Messaging (IM) applications. These databases
are not indexed in conventional search engines. Access to them is
usually through some sort of registration and authorization checks,
subscriptions, Application Programming Interface (APIs), and PayPal
services (Sui et al., 2015).
Issues and Constraints
Undoubtedly, the deep web though has numerous advantages, also has
issues that pose great constraints and concerns for users. On the
positive side, it houses a lot of entire internet resources that are far
hidden from the surface web and can only be accessed by specialized
anonymous cyber-tools; guaranteeing the privacy of users. These
cyber-tools shield users from online surveillance hide their identity
and do not permit the trailing of the user’s online activity (Bellaby,
2018). In the ensuing discussions, issues, and constraints to safe and
easy utilization of the deep web technology are highlighted. Issues
around speed, cybersecurity, deep web coverage, ethics, and
complexity of the access to internet resources beyond the surface web
are also presented.
Anonymity on the invisible web: Anonymous surfing of the internet
can be of good or bad intentions as there exist diverse resources on
the web, so are numerous internet users with varying
search/transaction interests. A typical example is human rights
activists and journalists who use these anonymous networks to track
illegal dealings. Similarly, whistleblowers and groups in hostile
political and war zones also leverage on the solid layer of encryption
and anonymity offered by the deep web technology to traverse the
internet and report the true state of events (uncensored) without being
tracked by pieces of machinery opposed to such exposures.
On the other hand, fraudsters can also capitalize on the anonymity of
the technology to facilitate cybercrime (Crawley, 2019; Holland,
2020). Silk Road, for instance, was an illicit version of eBay and was
used by internet fraudsters to perpetrate all forms of illegal
transactions on the dark web using Bitcoins and virtual currencies that
are hidden within the anonymous networks. These crimes include
sales of illegal drugs, weapons, hiring of assassins, trafficking, and
child pornography, amongst others (Laverty, 2020).
These internet activities require privacy and protection of users and
web resources; thus are essential in guaranteeing confidence and
continuous reliance on any web resource. This is regardless of the part
of the web that is accessed. On the surface web, protocols such as the
HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS), Secure File Transfer
Protocol (SFTP), Secures Shell (SSH), Internet Protocol Security
(IPsec), Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) are known secure internet
protocols that provide these security features against fraud and data
theft (Weedmark, 2020). However, anonymous surfing of the internet
beyond the surface web, specifically on the dark web, requires the
deployment of highly encrypted anonymizing proxy networks such as
Tor or I2P to prevent the users from being tracked.
In addition to the use of these anonymized tools, further safety
measures are encouraged considering that all security and privacy of
the information of internet users are paramount and should not be
handled with levity. The reason is that some of the activities on the
deep web like checking emails and e-banking transactions among
others are legitimate interactions that most often result in the exposure
of user access codes like passwords, no matter how strong, unique,
and/or hard-to-guess the access codes might be. To safeguard these
confidential data, it is precautionary not to divulge key information or
grant requests based on trust. It is also recommended to cover the
webcam of the user’s computer before accessing the deep web to
prevent spying eyes from having visuals of your face and environs.
More so, turning off the plugins and scripts of the chosen browser is a
step towards hiding the IP address of the user. These smart practices
can help a user stay safe while surfing the internet.
Complexity issues of the invisible web: Web contents on the deep
web are not indexed on conventional search engines. Though some of
these contents are rendered through HTTP(s) protocols, they are
invisible on conventional browsers. Most of the web contents on the
deep web are innocuous and not illegal content as often perceived. It
also comprises contents that are too deprecated and obscure which at
times requires the use of web archives such as Wayback Machine
(http://web.archive.org/) to access these contents on the regular web
browsers (Crawley, 2019). Generally, the deep web deals with big
data that are uncatalogued; lacking structure.
The nature of website design also contributes to how complex the
website may be seen. Website owners might intentionally design the
site with a limitation for security and privacy reasons or it could also
be as a result of the constraints built into the site. For instance,
contents on dynamic web pages, blocked sites, websites requiring user
long-in authentication, or CAPTCHA constraints might be difficult to
be indexed since the crawlers are denied access until the
authentication requirements are supplied (HackerNoon, 2018). It
could also be that the webpage is designed to be accessed only for a
specified number of times, of which it becomes unavailable to
WebCrawler if access to it is made at the expiration of the allowed
attempts. A stringent measure could also be set on the website’s
robots.txt file, exclusively exempting it from being crawled by search
engines (Hawkins, 2016). Robots.txt is usually a file embedded in the
website that defines what file and web page should be accessible by
web crawlers.
Configuration and accessibility settings as highlighted above
contribute to the complexity of accessing resources on the deep web.
Interestingly, there might be cogent reasons why a user needs access
to ‘perceived’ private information on the internet. This could be the
search for a lost relative, old friend, business contact, etc. In some
cases, the user’s needs may be satisfied but not in most other cases.
Internet speed on the invisible web: When compared to the surface
web, accessing the information on the deep web is much slower. For a
search query to return the requested result, the deep web search
engine will need to search and analyze all searched page contents to
ensure that the query result is highly relevant in line with the desired
search string. On the contrary, conventional search engines access
information on the surface easily and faster because the crawlers can
find and access the web pages which are indexed and interlinked. For
the deep web, the databases are not indexed. Hence, the speed of
access is dependent on the speed at which the databases are found and
accessed (Laverty, 2020). On the surface web, the browser will need
to send all web requests through the user’s public IP address to the
relevant server, and requested information is retrieved, clearly a
straightforward process. In contrast, the random bouncing buffering
of data through several nodes on the Tor or I2P network means that
web requests will have to pass through these nodes and the resultant
effect is a decline in the speed of access and retrieval of web contents.
Depth of the invisible web: Deep web technology is ubiquitous and
often built into the security features of some organizations like the
paywalls of organizations in such a way that it tracks unauthorized
access to information which when caught, the intruder risks litigation
or arrest for copyright infringement and violation of the site’s terms of
use (Laverty, 2020). The deep web is also remarkable in terms of the
depth and accuracy of its results. Comparatively, it is believed that the
surface web occupies about 19 Terabytes of the web’s storage
capacity while over 7500 Terabyte web contents are domiciled in the
deep web (Deep web, 2019). The content of the deep web is about
500 times larger than the surface web. Surprisingly, these huge
resources are rarely accessed by conventional search engines since
most of the data are private and personal information that is not
indexed. In other cases, the resources are either deprecated, outdated,
or are tucked away in databases in such a way that they are hidden
beyond the reach of the crawling capacity of search engines (Bischoff,
2018). Files in cloud storage servers, private social media profiles,
and academic journals, among others also constitute web contents that
are not necessarily indexed by conventional search engines. Normally,
queries on deep web search engines are well-constructed strings that
cover far more ground, thereby streamlining the results to a more
efficient, higher quality, and relevant content (Lynch, 2020) and with

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over 96% coverage of the entire internet resources, the deep web has
an inner layer called the dark web.
The dark web is termed ‘dark’ because of its ability to provide greater
privacy on the internet (Wolford, 2018). Oftentimes, this privacy is
achieved through the set-up of fully encrypted anonymizing proxy
networks that run on specialized search engines such as Infomine,
Complete Planet, Deep Dive, and TechXtra. These tools allow the
user to locate these hidden and unindexed databases on the internet.
Nevertheless, they require the use of additional specialized browsers
like the .onion browser to view the web contents. It is also worthy of
mention that the depth of anonymity found in the deep web is
dependent on the strength of the encryption, the size of the network,
the number of concurrent users, and the internal architecture of the
system (Mann, 2019).
Ethical issues with invisible web: Being an unregulated zone with
untraceable internet activities, questions on the confidentiality, ethics,
and legality of the deep web becomes imminent. Lack of ethical
guidelines leads to unauthorized access to sensitive personal
information from normally restricted databases. Consequently, this
creates dilemmas that make individuals susceptible to fraud and
identity theft (Lynch, 2020). Sadly, authorities with mandates to
tackle crime on the invisible web are most times in a fix of taking
decisions that will curb the crime and at the same time ensure that the
fundamental human rights of the victims and even suspects are
preserved. Ethical issues such as this have affected the impact on the
fight against illicit activities on the web. In an attempt to solve this
problem, government anticrime agencies use undercover agents to
infiltrate the networks of anonymous internet users, some of which
might be criminals, to gain knowledge about their activities and
subsequently arrest those with criminal motives (Hadjimatheou,
2017). While this seems ideal, at least from the point of eradicating
digitized crime, the action raises ethical issues bothering the rights of
innocent users. One clear implication of this monitoring activity is
that the privacy of a legitimate user who chose to be anonymous on
the internet is bridged by the prying eyes of the anti-cybercrime
agencies. It also undermines the trust of users who see the invisible
web as a safe place devoid of incessant cyber-attacks and political
persecution (Hadjimatheou, 2017).
Ethical considerations as they relate to interstate and boundary
jurisdiction is another issue worth considering in the fight against
cybercrime on the deep web. For a well-established and investigated
cybercrime case, the security agents at times are constrained with
boundary jurisdiction imbroglio – a situation where they do not have
the authorized and legal right to pursue fraudsters across boundaries.
This is now mitigated through the adequate collaboration of security
agencies via Interpol services across the globe.
Another ethical issue that raises concern on the use of the deep web is
the informed consent seeking process that comes in form of cookies
or terms and conditions agreement which must be accepted before
access on a web page can be granted. This pervasive demand for
consent without a clear understanding of its hidden details falls short
of the standard informed consent seeking process; thus posing a threat
to the sincerity of purpose of the website and the privacy of the user
(Bellaby, 2018). Furthermore, the power of anonymity inherent in the
deep web has put all users at liberty to trade on any area of interest,
often not minding whose right to privacy and safety is affected. From
the foregoing, there is a need to curtail this power overflow but it
must be done with caution to ensure the liberal right to freedom of
speech is maintained (Gehl, 2016). Be that as it may, it is not
unlawful to use the deep web neither is it bad to remain anonymous
on the web provided transparency, freedom, and rights of all are
preserved. The goal standard is for government policymakers to
develop more comprehensive law enforcement, regulatory and
national security responses that will take into cognizance of the good
and bad uses of the invisible web (Sui et al., 2015).
Cybercrime on the invisible web: Surfing the internet anonymously
is not without its attendant effect of exposing users to activities
considered illegal in some country settings. This is because the deep
web has the potentials to host increasingly high numbers of malicious
services and activities. These cybercrime issues could range from
gambling, illicit trading on weapons, drugs, credit card fraud, identity
theft, and leaks of sensitive information to things like the hiring of
assassins, terrorism, child trafficking, and pornography, illegal
financial transactions using cryptocurrency among others (Chertoff &
Simon, 2015). Deceptively and aesthetically, most of the web pages
harboring these illicit intentions and contents still present login
information and security checks as one would find in a normally
trusted website. Genuine internet users are cautioned to be watchful
for these cybercrime flags while on the invisible web to avoid being
coerced into subscribing to any of the platforms.
The evolution of malware programs is another contending issue on
the invisible web. Malware (also known as malicious software) are
programs such as viruses, worms, ransom ware, spyware, Trojan,
scareware, etc. that are intentionally designed to cause damage to a
computer, server, client, or computer network. Precisely, they are
built to disrupt or deny operations, gather the information that leads to
loss of privacy or exploitation, gain unauthorized access to system
resources, and other abusive behavior (Nash, 2005). There is no
gainsaying the fact that the dark web is increasingly becoming the
harbor for most malware programs. The dark web provides an
enabling environment for seamless anonymous communication
between malware servers. For example, Trojan malware such as
Skynet, NionSpy, Vawtrack, and Dyre are now taking advantage of
the vast network of computers and protection afforded by Tor and I2P
networks to mine, steal and spread programs on the dark web. These
unabated malware attacks are projected to increase considering the
steady migration of malware programs from the surface web to the
dark web (Cox, 2015). Consequently, users of the dark web, whether
for good or bad intentions, despite having the benefit of being
anonymous, are now susceptible to malware attacks, which if not
carefully controlled with powerful antimalware programs, can lead to
the loss of data or damage of the system used. On the long run, users
will always be at crossroads, weighing the options of anonymity and
safety from malware attacks.
Poor access control to the invisible web: Technologically, users of
the deep web are constrained with access to a unified query interface
for the deep web databases. This is because the deep web contains
massive, dynamic, and heterogeneous resources that are usually
tucked in an unindexed network of databases. Each of the databases
provides a specific query interface for users to access (Liu et al.,
2014). For instance, a deep web query system for an airline booking
system will present to users a single interface for querying multiple
related databases in the system and then extracts and returns the
relevant information from different web database sources that were
queried for the users (Swami et al., 2013). Now, for a large source of
data, it becomes very difficult to traverse these databases. This will
certainly remain a challenge until an integrated query interface in
connection with specific domains for unified access to the data in the
domain is effectively built (Liu, Xie & Chang 2014). It is also
noteworthy that deep web interfaces are unpolished, less standardized,
and would always require higher levels of user involvement albeit
continued effort by researchers through the application of different
pattern matching algorithms, filtering algorithms, and modeling with
an overall goal of mitigating these challenges promises brighter future
for ease of use of this domain (Thomaz et al., 2020).
Conclusion
The deep web is made up of peer-to-peer connections, which allow
users to share files directly (and secretly). It contains about 96% of
the www content. Due to its strong appeal to privacy and anonymity
features, internet fraudsters of all kinds now take advantage of the
lack of tracking their identity to shield their anonymity from
advertisers and officials alike despite its known potential benefits.
Similarly, journalists, police, military, whistleblowers around the
world now rely on it as a more secure alternative to the public web
when searching for sensitive or dangerous information. The deep web
is majorly composed of contents that are not indexed, contents with
restricted access, private content, and information archived in
searchable databases. This implies that not all information on the deep
is deliberately hidden. Some might just be behind certain cyber-walls
that require payments or authentication to access them.
The Tor network is among the different privacy tools that help users
anonymously access internet resources on the deep web.
Unfortunately, amidst the numerous advantages of a Tor network,
research has shown that activities on the network can be tracked by
internet service providers due to the Tor node IPs that are usually
public. Again, its effectiveness can only be valued when configured
properly and used with compatible external applications (Bojarski
2015). Bischoff (2018) reports that this challenge can be mitigated by
setting up Tor privately using a Tor bridge or VPN to prevent the
blockage of Tor exit nodes which are usually accessible by providers
and can easily be blocked by them at ease.
In light of the above findings, a powerful (preferably licensed) VPN is
strongly recommended for all users of the deep web because it is built
to encrypt users’ data and helps to ensure the privacy of the user
online (Norton 2019). A combination of the Tor network and VPN is

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a hybrid architecture that can maximize internet security and privacy.
Additional security can be achieved by enabling the “NoScript” and
“Forbid Scripts Globally” extensions on the Tor browser. The user
can as well, change the value of the “javascript_enabled” config file
from “true” to “false” (Deep web 2019).
This review paper highlights the importance of users willing to
explore the benefits of deep web technology to be aware of the
security issues inherent in it and therefore deploy appropriate
precautionary measures in surfing the internet. These review findings
show that doing this most likely will prevent internet users from
nefarious characters and sites that are designed to spread malware or
hack the computer.
Conflict of Interest
Authors have declared that there is no conflict of interest reported in
this work.
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