The first thing I told myself was to resist the temptation to post “yoloswag” or something else stupid because I realized that I couldn’t troll like I usually do on most websites. This was serious business, and there was no room for jokes. One mistake and I could get in trouble. For the first time, I had to take everything on the Internet seriously. 

I was exploring the “Deep Web.”

For those who don’t know, the Deep Web is a hidden section of the Internet that is completely anonymous. It was originally created by the U.S. government in order to have a place for law enforcement or military personnel to discuss things in complete anonymity; ironically, this Deep Web is now notorious for illegal activities. People use the secrecy of the Deep Web to participate in illegal activities including murder for hire, drug sales, weapon sales, money laundering and child pornography. 

The worst part is that anyone can download the software to access this part of the Internet. 

I decided to see if it was really the huge blackmarket that people claimed it to be. In 2011, U.S. Senators Joe Machin and Charles Schumer sent a letter to the attorney general urging him to shut it down, which clearly did not happen. I wanted to see if it really needed to be shut down.

In order to access the Deep Web I had to download the “tor” browser, which would allow for complete anonymity by doing some black magic with my IP address that I am too lazy to bother comprehending. After booting it up, my first thought was “Don’t do anything stupid,” followed by “Why is this browser so slow?” You would think that a browser frequented by criminals and the leaders of the cyber blackmarket would be faster, but I guess not. 

At any rate, I decided to start looking for all the sketchy websites filled with illegal activity, a task that I felt would consume hours. I had no idea how wrong I was.

Alarmingly enough, within 5 minutes, I had found over 100 websites only available on the Deep Web through “The Hidden Wiki” a directory of many hidden websites. This directory categorized all of them; there were some relatively normal topics like Minecraft and there were even some beneficial ones that discussed things like alternative energy, but most had some … sketchy labels. These categories included drugs, banking, occultism and erotica. 

If a 17-year-old average high school student could find this many illegal websites, this network had some serious problems. 

However, a vast majority of the links on the directory didn’t work, possibly due to the government cracking down on these sites or, even more likely, due to the browser being too slow. A drug addict might be willing to wait an hour for a drug market website to load, but I have better things to do with my time. Like college apps. Just kidding, who actually does those?

Even though most of the links didn’t load for me, I still found many sites full of illicit activity. One of the sites had counterfeit U.S. bills for sale in exchange for Bitcoins, the virtual currency of the Deep Web. Some sites sold fake IDs and passports. Others had firearms for sale and perhaps the most intimidating ones were the contract killing websites. Not a place to post “yoloswag.” After all, I only live once. 

And, of course, a huge number of sites had drugs for sale. Once again, I was astounded that I had so easily found these websites out in the open, but then again they didn’t have to worry about being caught. 

Finally, I decided to approach the forums. Some seemed normal, but others were … disturbing to say the least. For starters, there was one labeled “Human Experimentation” with the caption of “We go where few dare.”  I certainly did not dare to go their site. Other sites were revolutionary forums, encouraging us to free ourselves from the government. “Came for the drugs, stayed for the revolution” was one of the comments found on the forums. 

After a few hours of exploring the deepest, darkest parts of the web, I decided to leave the Deep Web. Currently, people are still unsure of whether to shut it down. Let me be clear: It’s to society’s benefit to shut down the Deep Web.  

If a random high school student like me can find drugs, firearms and murder training, it’s clear this part of the Internet should be locked away. Anonymity and Internet freedom are good things, but the harms presented by illegal trafficking and the like outweigh these concerns. 

While the government has been trying to crack down on the criminals, this is the wrong approach. For starters, there aren’t enough resources for apprehending all the criminals using the Deep Web; there are less than 200 FBI agents on cyberspace, nowhere near enough.

 According to Marcus Thomas, former assistant director of the FBI’s technology division, efforts to fight the criminals of the Deep Web is “nowhere near adequately funded” as mentioned in a Time article. 

To further highlight the ineffectiveness of the current government approach, in October, the most famous website on the Deep Web, the Silk Road, was shut down, after an arrest of the suspected mastermind, Ross Ulbricht. Unfortunately, this victory was short-lived. In November, just one month after the arrest, there were reports of a Silk Road 2.0 coming out, clearly showing that the current government approach isn’t effective; apprehending criminals isn’t enough. There needs to be a full shutdown of the network. 

Even though it may have its uses, when it’s to the point that any person with a computer and Internet can get on the cyber black market, the hidden web has gone too far. Perhaps the government could make a new network, one that a 6-year-old with a keyboard couldn’t get onto. 

At any rate, it should be painfully obvious that this part of the Internet is too dangerous and full of far too much illegal activity. For now, I’ll stick with Reddit.