Exploring the Tails OS

Hi all

I am exploring the Tails OS in my spare time and a noob to ToR. I have been searching some onion links but majority are slow or not working at all. Is there any reliable search engine for the dark web?

Thanks

Comments

  • I have been searching some onion links

    Jamie Oliver has some good recipes.

  • +5

    I am exploring the Tails OS in my spare time

    …Why?

    I have been searching some onion links but majority are slow or not working at all.

    Indeed. It's almost like being on the TOR network is a massive pain, and that for most webmasters there's infinity reasons to just be a regular website on the clearweb instead.

    Y'know, unless they need to be on TOR for some reason.

    Is there any reliable search engine for the dark web?

    Probably not. Because there's no real incentive for one to exist, and any attempt to make a consolidated, indexed listing of dark web sites would glow to high heaven and everyone would be (rightly) suspicious of it.

    If a given onion website had a legit, non-dodgy purpose and wanted visibility and high-volume traffic, they'd be on the clearweb. (You get what I'm saying?)

    • +1

      Everyone should learn operational security, why make it easy to be spied upon when you have no idea how that information could be used against you in the future

      Doubtful, but there are still a ton of legitimate reasons to be on the TOR network, for example they could be an activist living under an oppressive regime

      • Everyone should learn operational security, why make it easy to be spied upon when you have no idea how that information could be used against you in the future

        Sure, but the thing about Tails is that only a very specific profile of person uses Tails/TOR anyway. We're never going to get to the point where a large enough volume of unassuming people are using those technologies for mundane work (despite what all the l33tbros keep insisting will happen). It's just too much of a pain to use. Most people who are using TOR/Tails/etc are using it for the obvious reasons. Which means that you're basically painting a target on your back just by being known to be familiar with these sorts of tools.

        there are still a ton of legitimate reasons to be on the TOR network, for example they could be an activist living under an oppressive regime

        I doubt there are a "ton" of legitimate reasons, but I'll consneed that activists hiding from their governments is one.

        • How many hundreds of millions of people live in places where just talking negatively about the current government/dictator/monarch is a punishable offence? The US government invented and significantly funds the TOR network because it's effectively a cyber-weapon, the digital equivalent of funding rebel groups

          And I mean it already is at that point, there are around 2-3 million daily users of the TOR network, which is really telling when it sucks to use

          Besides, having people be familiar with anti-censorship tools ahead of time is the single greatest defense against totalitarianism

          • @Jolakot:

            Taliban leader Anas Haqqani hit back at the remarks on Twitter, writing: “Mr. Harry! The ones you killed were not chess pieces, they were humans; they had families who were waiting for their return.

            What censorship. Even Taliban has free speech on Twitter.

            Says the guy who trains suicide squad.

        • Which means that you're basically painting a target on your back

          Connect to Tor via overseas VPN tunnel. The back gets blurry :)

        • I doubt there are a "ton" of legitimate reasons, but I'll consneed that activists hiding from their governments is one.

          Not a lot of legitimate reasons for the general populace of western democracies, no. But that is because they don't feel they need it, don't want it, aren't interested, don't care, etc. The general populace are not very privacy conscious, and generally have a laissez-faire attitude towards it: "If Google want's to know what innane conversations I'm having, then so be it…". People are commonly apathetic towards privacy until such time as it impacts them. I'll always remember how insurer's quoted hotmail users a higher premium, and that was a fairly innane case…

          "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”' Benjamin Franklin

          Yes, Tor is used prolifically by nefarious operators, but that doesn't mean Tor itself is evil or unnecessary. Tor is first and foremost a privacy tool.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_(network)#History:

          The core principle of Tor, onion routing, was developed in the mid-1990s by United States Naval Research Laboratory employees, mathematician Paul Syverson, and computer scientists Michael G. Reed and David Goldschlag, to protect American intelligence communications online

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_(network)#Usage:

          In 2014, the EFF's Eva Galperin told Businessweek that "Tor's biggest problem is press. No one hears about that time someone wasn't stalked by their abuser. They hear how somebody got away with downloading child porn."

  • Haven't looked at darkweb in a few years, I used duckduckgo. Search for Darkweb sites index or directory or something? It used to give some forum style websites that have long listings of onion websites.
    'Most' of the illegal stuff are poor people offering nothing but to scam you of your money.
    All the hype is by idiots with no clue trying to make the darkweb look bad, it's no worse than reddit - lol.
    Can you go down a dark rabbit hole YES, just like you can on regular internet.
    It can be painfully slow to use because of tor.
    If you really want your daily dose of GUNK, just use reddit instead.

  • +1

    I've got TAILS on a labelled USB at home, and when Mrs Bargains picked it up one day I explained that it's my collection of naked behinds. She dropped it in disgust and has never touched it since.

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