The public interest in the Dark Web is growing, especially among regular users. These include everyday people like you or me, who aren't criminals, but are extremely interested in the Dark Web, due to the overload of content that we get from the media.
TV shows (Mr. Robot, CSI:Cyber, Black Mirror, to name a few), movies, books, documentaries, and every form of media have been covering the Dark Web in the past few years, and it looks like the trend will only continue.
On the news, we hear about massive hacks (Facebook, British Airways, Ashley Madison, and others) where the data stolen is offered on the Dark Web to the highest bidder.
This image was displayed by British Airways, following their hack:
All these have made even the most technophobic individuals interested in accessing the Dark Web, just to take a peek at what they hear about.
As we move forward in this book, you'll realize that there's not that much of a difference between the Surface Web and the Dark Web, except for two main factors—the technological one: the requirement to use specific software to access content there, and the philosophical one—anonymity and privacy abounds there, which simply makes it easier for the criminal elements to perform their activities without revealing who they are.
That's the main reason why illicit activities are more pronounced or readily available for viewing on the Dark Web.
But as we've discussed, and will continue to discuss, taking the proper precautions to protect your anonymity and your security will provide a user experience very similar to what you usually experience on the Surface Web.
Private delivery services will provide untraceable, secure, and anonymous delivery.
One of the things that many people dislike is the way that most regular delivery services invade their privacy. The goal of these delivery companies will be to provide autonomous and anonymous drones, invisible to street-cams, radar, and infrared scanners, delivering packages, payed in cryptocurrency, with no logs of the deliveries.
Yes, this can be used for delivery of illegal products, but one proposed safety mechanism would be detecting bombs or other weapons of mass destruction, and only delivering objects that aren't publicly dangerous. I expect this to be something that will gain focus, since sending such objects, which might result in harm to others, would be a liability to these delivery services, and would harm their reputation and income from the non-criminal market. But, as we are talking about the future, let's wait and see.
One of the problems on the Dark Web is the lack of a justice system. There is no organization that moderates or is supposed to prevent wrong-doing. Of course, there's a very fine line between what's wrong and right on the Dark Web, but it can be agreed that the original intent of the Dark Web is to enhance anonymity and privacy, and not to condone crime. Having said that, many experts agree that actions that harm the privacy and anonymity of an individual or of a business entity should be prevented, in addition to scams and theft, ensuring honest trading (buy/sell anonymously and don't cheat the other side). Sadly, reality is a little different, and people of a less than sterling nature will always try to take advantage of others and do what they want without consideration of morality.
Thankfully, there's an evolution of a Dark Web justice system, which according to the signs, will be a peer justice system, with the majority of users deciding how to resolve conflicts and how to penalize wrong-doers.