For the past two years, soft drugs were the most-exchanged goods in the Deep Web.
That's according to Trend Micro's recent report into the mysteries of the Deep Web. Soft drugs were followed by pharmaceutical products like Ritalin and Xanax, hard drugs, and even pirated games and online accounts.
Trend Micro defines the Deep Web as any Internet content that, for various reasons, can't be or isn't indexed by search engines like Google.
It cites the Silk Road marketplace as an example of the Deep Web. Ross Ulbricht, 31, the mastermind behind the Silk Road underground Web site, was sentenced recently to life in prison for orchestrating a scheme that enabled more than $200 million of anonymous online drug sales using the digital currency Bitcoin.
The Deep Web, thus, includes dynamic Web pages, blocked sites, unlinked sites, private sites, non-HTML/-contextual/-scripted content, and limited-access networks, Trend Micro notes.
User profile
These include sites with domain names that have been registered on Domain Name System (DNS) roots that are not managed by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers and feature URLs with non-standard top-level domains that generally require a specific DNS server to properly resolve.
"A smart person buying recreational drugs online wouldn't want to type related keywords into a regular browser," says Ihab Moawad, vice-president MMEA and CIS.
"He/she will need to anonymously go online using an infrastructure that will never lead interested parties to his/her IP address or physical location. Drug sellers wouldn't want to set up shop in an online location whose registrant law enforcement can easily determine where the site's IP address exists in the real world, too."
According to Trend Micro, there are many other reasons, apart from buying drugs, why people would want to remain anonymous or set up sites that can't be traced back to a physical location or entity.
It notes people who want to shield their communications from government surveillance may require the cover of darknets.
"Whistle-blowers may want to share vast amounts of insider information with journalists without leaving a paper trail. Dissidents in restrictive regimes may need anonymity to safely let the world know what's happening in their country," the report notes.
On the flip side, it adds, people who want to plot the assassination of a high-profile target will want guaranteed but untraceable means.
Other illegal services like selling documents such as passports and credit cards also require an infrastructure that guarantees anonymity. The same can be said for people who leak other people's personal information like addresses and contact details, says Trend Micro.
Hard to crack
Moawad points out that because of its nature, it's impossible to determine the number of Deep Web pages and content at any given time or to provide a comprehensive picture of everything that exists in it.
The stealth and untraceable nature of certain parts of the Deep Web makes it so no one can say with certainty they have fully explored its depths, he notes.
According to Moawad, anonymity in the Deep Web will continue to raise a lot of issues and will be a point of interest for any party who wishes to circumvent government surveillance or interference.
"Currently, it seems to be a battle between 'extreme libertarians' and law enforcement agencies, with the former doing everything possible to find new ways to become even more anonymous and untraceable.
"What this means is that the fight against the Deep Web will require dedication and hard work and as such, security defenders need to continue to monitor the Deep Web as its role in the Internet and the real world grows."
In terms of raw number of domains on the Deep Web, English was the main language of choice by at least 2 154 sites out of the 3 454 successfully scouted domains, says Trend Micro.
That roughly makes up 62% of the total number of sites. This was followed by Russian (228 domains), then French (which may include French and Canadian-French sites, 189 domains).
However, the security solutions vendor says looking at the language distribution based on number of URLs, Russian beat English because, despite having fewer sites, the number of sites that used Russian was bigger.
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