There are possible chances that you all must have heard of the Deep web, Dark web, and Darknet, and sometimes people get confused while differentiating between them. Did you know that we can only access 4% of the resources from some of the most popular search engines like Google, Bing, etc. The rest of 96% of the resources are not accessible to all and require additional tools to access those contents.
We can clearly say that the Internet is very vast and what we use on a daily basis is only a chunk of it. The Internet is much more than that but first, one should be clear about the difference between the Internet and the Web.
In this post, we’re going to narrow down the differences between all of them and will try to picture how they are different from each other. So, let’s begin.
What is Surface Web or Indexed Web?
Popularly known as the visible web or indexed web is a unit of the WWW (World Wide Web) that is open for general usage and can be accessible by anyone around the world. To access this, one must have a working Internet connection and will also require a search engine (such as Google, Bing, etc.) to access the content.
As an Internet consumer, you get all the relevant information whatever you search and there are almost unlimited resources available which are just 4% of the entire net. For this reason, all the access data must be indexed through any search engine. Now let’s understand the basics of the Indexed web for better clarity.
Indexed Web
Have you ever wondered how come a result pops up on your screen when you type something on a search bar? Well, the contents are pre-stored in the database (master), and when you search something like – “What is an H2O?” the database will fetch the report and provide you with the most accurate format and for this, the search engine uses spider technique that binds up all the information throughout the globe and collects new data time to time. This is how a search engine works that is purely a surfaced web.
What is the Deep Web?
The deep web can also be termed an “Incognito Mode” of the web which cannot be accessed by search engines. Talking about neveropen, this website is open to all and can be accessed for general purposes, but data such as banking, cloud, government data, etc. are sensitive and private, that’s why they are out of reach from the general public.
The private database has become a crucial part of today’s world, you can take an example of any premium OTT platforms (such as Netflix, Hotstar, etc.) or blogging sites like Medium where users can access a limited amount of content as a part of their free subscription and they only get an extension of their consumption when they turn their subscription model into the paid version. This is simply another example of a deep web.
What is Dark Web?
Darknet provides a user with anonymity but a service was introduced that allowed someone to host a website on the darknet and remain anonymous. This attracted people who do illegal stuff to sell things without getting caught. To access such a database, one must need specific tools and software, and would require a lot of precautions to access such data.
One example is a website called the silk road which was on a darknet called TOR, used to sell drugs, and was taken down by the FBI. It might seem a bit scary but the darknet is very useful too, for which it was created, to provide anonymity to the government official, journalists, and even us. But, not everything is illegal on the dark web, there are numerous active secret communities that use this channel as a method of establishing communications and are used by many different agencies.
Now, let’s understand the difference between the Deep web and Dark Web.
Difference between the Deep Web and Dark Web
The key difference between the deep web and a dark web is that they both are different from the surface internet and cannot be accessed for general purposes. However, the deep web requires authorization and the dark web requires specific sets of tools and software for decryption.
Moreover, the deep web is not completely hidden and is a part of WWW (World Wide Web), whereas the dark web is completely hidden and cannot be accessed by any normal search engines.
To access the dark web, one requires to mask their identity by using an onion router (which is heavily funded by the US Dept. of State), and one of the most popular ways of accessing the dark web is Tor which helps in encrypting all required information before connecting.
You may also refer to this article to learn more about the difference between the deep web and the dark web: Difference between Deep Web and Dark Web
What is Dark Net?
It is a network built over the internet that is encrypted. Darknet provides anonymity to the users. One such darknet is Tor (The Onion Router). Special software is required to enter this network like the Tor browser, which is required to enter into Tor’s network. TOR can access regular websites also, a website on this network has .onion address. Many hidden services are provided on Dark Net. Friend-to-Friend is another kind of darknet where two-person transfer data between them anonymously. Only concerned people have access to it and it is encrypted and password protected. Besides this, Freenet is also a darknet that is used for file transfer anonymously, there are many other darknets available.
Conclusion
In earlier days of the Internet, data was used to transfer across the Internet but no Web existed at that time but in 1989, Tim Berners-Lee introduced the World Wide Web which can be used to access hyperlinked text or web pages. So, basically, the Web is software that runs over the internet to provide this service. But the Web doesn’t include only websites like Facebook, Google, Geeksforneveropen, etc. These are on the surface web and can be indexed by search engines. It only constitutes 4-6% of the whole web which is above 5 Billion population around the world. Part of the WWW which is not indexed by a search engine like Google is Deep Web which is about 500-600 times larger than the surface web.
With the advancement of technology, several other modes of resources came into the limelight – the so-called Dark web, and the Deep web. The fact is none of them are outside the eyes of the law and one should use them wisely at their own risk.
