Bitcoin: Sex, violence, drugs, and all your ambitions and desires on the dark web (Part 2)

Background:

The dark web is an ungovernment territory hidden in the civilized world. You may never know that the Internet we are familiar with has another hideous side, which is full of sex, drugs and killing. Everything here is clearly marked with a price: a Desert Eagle is worth $1,450, a forged British passport is worth 2,000 pounds, a gram of pure cocaine is worth $80, a personal credit card information is worth $14, a hacking service is worth $200, and a person's life is worth $10,000...

If you are ready, look up at the blue sky for the last time, hold your breath, and dive into the dark web world full of boiling desires.

Wikipedia Underground

Due to the hidden nature of the dark web , it is impossible to gain such a large user base as the surface websites through large-scale publicity. Therefore, precise classification navigation has become a popular form. For example, a classification navigation website called "UnderDir" contains more than 11,000 dark web sites. It is divided into 12 categories, including business, politics, technology, pornography, religion and many other categories, and even has a dedicated search engine.

【Under Dir Dark Web Classification Navigation Engine】

In the world of the dark web, there is no single dominant search engine. Various engines compete with each other, and the content searched using the same keywords is not exactly the same. However, the search experience on the dark web is far from pleasant. Whether through category navigation or search engines, the website you enter is likely to be inaccessible. Among the more than 11,000 websites included in "UnderDir", 7,545 are offline. Almost all search engines will provide information on the time when the "webpage was last successfully accessed". If it is proven that it has been offline, it will be marked as "Offline" in this search result. The reason why search engines retain these dead links is that dark websites are often tracked or interfered with, and are very unstable. They may go offline at any time depending on the situation, or they may come back to life in an instant. For "ambitious" websites - such as Silk Road - staying online at all times is a guarantee of "good reputation".

Although a considerable number of websites on the dark web are involved in illegal activities, there are also some technical websites or theme forums that are not illegal. Being able to have your own entry on "The Hidden Wiki" is probably an important "endorsement" of the website's strength. This dark web version of Wikipedia includes some famous entries, and authorized users can also create new entries. However, compared with the comprehensiveness and accuracy of Wikipedia, the entries here are in a mess, and there are strange entries such as "The Truth of the Bible", "How to Clean the Bathroom", "Precautions for Buying a House", etc. If the user searches for an entry that has not been created, the website will automatically provide search engine results.

【The Hidden Wiki in the Dark Web】

A large number of pornographic websites (including child pornography websites) can be found through classified websites or search engines. Unlike the surface network, there are few forms of monetization such as casino advertisements. Most websites require direct payment of Bitcoin to obtain membership and download resources. It has to be said that the business form of the dark web is quite backward. And this closed ecological structure is destined not to produce complex transaction forms. One hand pays money, the other hand delivers goods. The trading rules formed since primitive society have become the standard gameplay here.

Heaven is to the left, Shadownet is to the right

We are a team of 3 killers, accepting missions in the United States (including Canada) and Europe. Once we receive your payment, we will contact you within 1-2 days. Depending on the target you want to eliminate, we will continue to contact you for 1-3 weeks. The only rule is: do not kill children under 16 years old, and the top ten politicians.

This is also a page "Powered by Torshop". The commodity is human life. The killer said so calmly that he would take a person's life for $10,000, just like a boring housekeeping service. The cruelty of the dark web began to slide uncontrollably into the abyss at this point.

[The killer's price in the dark web]

In the dark web, there are still secret doors leading to an even darker basement. This place is like Limbo in "Inception", which makes drug lords and pedophiles unable to bear to look directly. This is the legendary shadow network.

All the legends about the shadow web originated from a post by a Reddit user: "a warning to those thinking about accessing the shadow web" . The post describes in detail how the author, a gas station employee, got a card by chance, which detailed how to enter the shadow web: download a special browser and set special parameters in the browser. A link that makes no sense in a normal browser or even a Tor browser makes a crisp "click" sound, revealing the true appearance of this website.

[Website entrance claiming to be able to enter the film network]

According to the author’s description, he recharged Bitcoin without knowing the reason and entered a live broadcast room - Redroom . The content in the room made him unforgettable:

A strong man, following the instructions of his "Master", brutally tortured and killed an Arab woman step by step using various means. The "Master" even paid the abuser an extra $500 to dig out her eyes in front of the camera.

The author was afraid to watch what was happening on the screen because of the screams and cruel killings. He ran to the toilet and vomited. When the screams finally stopped, he dared to go back to the computer and saw the victim lying dead in front of the camera. There were only two empty holes in his eyes and blood was constantly flowing out. But the administrator said calmly: Thank you for watching. The next one will start in an hour.

This story even has a sequel. Many people left messages questioning the authenticity of the author's words. One of them managed to contact the author of the post. The author gave him a copy of the card, and he entered the shadow network according to the instructions on the card. He also posted a message on Reddit to confirm it, and advised everyone not to try to enter the shadow network. Later, it is said that the author of the post never appeared online again, and at the same time, a bizarre murder occurred in a originally peaceful town.

There are no screenshots of web pages in all the posts involved in this incident, which also casts a dark fog over the whole incident. However, the reason why this incident has been lingering for a long time like a ghost is that Shadow Network is completely feasible in terms of technology. As long as a special network protocol and specific browser parameters are used, Shadow Network's server can be opened to specific people for browsing. Rather than saying that this is Shadow Network, it is better to say that it is a cruel live broadcast room that is both in the network and isolated from the world. The most chilling thing is that in some turbulent Arab or African countries, vendettas and massacres occur frequently. As long as these perverted killers choose Shadow Network's technology, Redroom can actually become possible. According to the revelations of users who claim to be "informed sources" on the Internet, some ISIS members are using death shows to raise funds.

Leifeng.com reporters searched "Redroom" as a keyword on various search engines on the dark web and obtained surprising results.

【Entrance to a Redroom website】

You have arrived at the Redroom of ShadowNet, where the Death Show takes place every other week (as long as the number of participants reaches the standard). We have customized the Firefox browser and used the SPDY protocol to ensure your anonymous access. You need to pay 0.5 Bitcoin to get the download link of the "Secure Browser", and we will notify you 24 hours before the show. Welcome to the club.

The reporter applied for an anonymous email address as required and sent an email to it to request the website's Bitcoin wallet address, but two days later, no response was received from the website. A careful reading of the date of this statement: October 27, 2015, only one month ago. According to the frequency of "once every other week" announced by the website, at least two death shows have been held here. The fee standard for website membership is almost exactly the same as the price in the Reddit post.

This website is just one of countless websites that call themselves Redroom. There are many more websites that claim that you can watch the bloody killing show of Redroom as long as you pay, clearly indicating the price of being a "Master" (the person who decides the sadistic method) and a "Spectator" (the audience), as well as the precautions for every detail, and even deciding whether the age of the victim is Preteen (-18), Teen (18-30) or Adult (30+). All similar website entrances have a signature welcome message: "Have fun, hope our room makes you happy!" This sentence is as chilling as the devil.

The fact that no one has yet been arrested for a “killing show” like Silk Road founder Ulbricht may provide some comfort that Redroom does not exist.

Chinese in the Dark Web

Life is short, so you don’t have to worry about making a fortune!

Seeing such antithetical Chinese on the dark web gives people a long-lost sense of familiarity. This post by a user named "VIP" on the "Dark Web Chinese Forum" is aimed at finding a partner in carding (credit card fraud). To become a partner, you first need to pay a membership fee of 300 yuan, and then purchase credit card information at a price of 150-300 yuan per person, and provide a complete service. And left a cooperation email address, especially emphasizing that the content of the email needs to be encrypted, because you don't want "pig teammates".

[“Buying people post” on the Chinese dark web site]

On the few and somewhat depressed Chinese websites on the dark web, discussing ways to get rich is the mainstream trend (which echoes the "bright web" from a distance). People keep asking about "ways to make money quickly" and emphasize that "they don't mind breaking the law." Bank card fraud, cashing out stolen money, drug manufacturing, and gun trafficking have become several major "discussion topics." Users who claim to be Taiwanese, and the number of users using traditional Chinese characters and those using simplified Chinese characters are roughly half and half. In this community, the close relationship between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait makes people feel like they are in another world.

From the active topics on Torbay Deep Web Forum, Deep Web Chinese Page 1, and Dark Web Forum 114, we can roughly imagine a gun smuggling network across the Taiwan Strait. There was even a user claiming to be Taiwanese who posted a question about how to sneak from Mong Cai, Vietnam to China because he had entered the government's "blacklist" of people banned from entering the country.

There is no Chinese black market here, and the trading areas in major Chinese forums are not active. It is difficult to calculate how many people actually engage in illegal transactions, but from the posts of criticism or debt collection against "VIPs" posted from time to time on major sites, as well as the status of "VIPs" replying to posts, the Chinese circle on the dark web has two characteristics:

1. Not big;

2. In a small circle, the suspicion and fraud in the real world are presented more directly and more bloody.

Another special thing about the Chinese forums on the dark web is that people are keen on discussing political topics. Someone replied: "Posting here, at least it won't be deleted." It made people think about it for a long time and speechless.

Anonymous discusses guns in a Chinese forum on the dark web

end

When it comes to people roaming around in the dark web, in addition to black industry participants, scammers, curiosity hunters, and countless anonymous police officers, there are also some very impressive characters.

• A hacker who specializes in breaking into child pornography websites, deleting pictures and videos from them, said it was one of the few meaningful things in his life.

• There is a Spanish doctor who teaches drug addicts the correct way to take drugs free of charge. He said that he cannot stop drug addicts from taking drugs, but at least he can use his professional knowledge to reduce the harm caused by drugs to them.

They are considered outliers in the dark web.

If you are used to the wanton violation of rules in the dark web, you will inevitably feel lost when you return to reality. The dark web presents a strange social appearance because of its anarchy. Those who despise rules and yearn for freedom are most likely to become die-hard fans of the dark web, and danger, complexity, and fraud are the price of "freedom". In a purely anonymous network, the people who are most likely to profit are undoubtedly hackers who hide Trojans in web pages and capture curiosity seekers, as well as scammers who pretend to have drugs, counterfeit money, or even live broadcasts of murders. If you linger in the dark web for many days, you will feel that the stories circulating in the dark web can be divided into three categories:

1. Countless people have committed shameful acts in the name of freedom;

2. Countless people tried desperately to cover up their crimes, but they were eventually exposed;

3. Countless people witnessed the mountains of corpses and seas of blood, but were still ready to take action.

There is no way that the dark web and the real world can be completely isolated. As you can imagine, the dark web world is related to everyone, whether it brings you freedom or shame.