To contemplate the future of the Dark Web, we need to also discuss the Deep Web, since they are intrinsically related. As I explained in Chapter 1, Understanding the Deep and Dark Web, the Dark Web is a sub-section of the Deep Web. The future is almost always unclear, especially regarding technology, which progresses in leaps and bounds, and is usually, not in a linear fashion.

If you remember, the Deep Web's difference from the Surface (WWW) Web is the fact that the sites and content there aren't crawled or indexed, so won't be accessible via standard search browsers.

Organizational content and intranets are part of the Deep Web, but more and more of them are being relocated from on-premise solutions, to cloud-based environments, such as AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. There is a concern among users of these technologies that the vendors are collecting information about them.

For example, Google has talked about non-stop collection of data, both private and otherwise. This is probably true regarding all search engines and/or hosting companies, so there will be changes in how organizations and people access the Deep Web.

These changes will include how they authenticate (biometrics, voice, 2FA, and more), how they access the Deep Web, and more.

But, ultimately, many sites, services, and users will change the way they access Deep Web content.

And what about the Dark Web, you might ask?

According to forecasts, the Dark Web will be become more mainstream, yet harder to breach.

The UI of applications designed to access the Dark Web, such as Tor, are becoming more user friendly, helping the mainstream trend.