7 of the best .onion sites to access in 2022

The dark web has definitely become a lot more popular nowadays even though it requires special means to access it. The Onion Router or Tor for short is a system of layered “nodes” each of which acts as individual VPNs of sorts to hide your online identity. But more importantly, it also lets you connect to the onion network anonymously which has caused a lot of controversy as allowing everyone accesses to a method of communication that is completely private does in the end make it easy to do illegal activities without law enforcement agencies catching them.

The network that Tor operates on. However, is far from perfect as your computer connects to the first node directly and if these entry-exit nodes become compromised, so does your privacy, and your online activity. 

What are .onion sites?

These are website addresses that end with .onion, these websites use anonymous hosting, and accessing them without connecting to the onion network is not possible. One of the most popular means of connecting to this network is through the Tor Browser. Simply download the Tor Browser from Tor Project’s website and install it, you are good to go!

7 .onion sites you should know

Remember, you will need to connect to the onion network before accessing any of these websites because you cannot access them from the regular internet!

Ahmia

Search engine for hidden services on the Tor network, you can use Ahmia to go through some of the websites that exist on the dark web. Simply put in a search term and view your results. You can also access Ahmia through the regular internet (we will call it clearnet from now on)

The Hidden Wiki

Serving as one of the oldest indexes or directories for links on the dark web, there have been dozens if not hundreds of alterations and different versions of the hidden wiki. Some of the easily accessible or found hidden wikis will have a limited collection of links on them, while the deeper ones will occasionally link to cult sites and other groups.

Either way, we recommend that anyone who is new to the dark web start their journey on the hidden wiki and then delve deeper into the abyss if they have the stomach for it.

CIA

You read that right! The CIA of all people has a dark website accessible only through the Tor network for communication and information. So, if you are afraid of the CIA catching you, fear not! You can still access their website without them knowing where exactly you are… or are you? We will talk about it later in this article, answering why you should not feel completely safe even when you are hiding behind the different layers of the onion network.

Wasabi Wallet

Combining the power of cryptocurrency with the anonymity of the Tor Network, Wasabi Wallet is a hot wallet, meaning that its access is possible via online means, it is not a physical wallet. We recommended it to everyone whose primary focus is on their privacy. Wasabi Wallet does have a dark website and it does process transactions through it. As if cryptocurrencies without the dark web being involved were not already hard to trace.

Zerobin 

Have you ever thought of using a website like Pastebin but one where even the server itself has no knowledge of the data in that specific bin? Where does no one know about the communication between one party and another? Do you think that technology has the potential for abuse? Well, Zerobin exists for exactly that purpose. All pasted data gets encrypted and decrypted by the browsers and only the encrypted data gets to the storage.

SecureDrop

Think of a whistleblower system where people can submit documents anonymously with no fear of exposure for the sender’s identity. Think about it existing behind several layers of the onion network, and the final icing on top of this cake: It is open-source software that makes sure that you can view the source code and have a guarantee that there is nothing malicious in it.

PrivacyTools

PrivacyTools is a website that lists a vast collection of software and tools that can help you maintain your privacy in an online world. From instant messaging applications to anonymous networks. They also provide links to software used to securely wipe your storage devices to make it impossible to recover the data. 

Is the dark web completely secure?

In a perfect world when there are a lot of individuals who set up their systems or home networks as relays, Tor would be a lot safer. But sadly, that is not the case. Your ISP, your local authorities, and even the entry node that you are connecting to can tell what your real IP address is, and that you are attempting to connect to the onion network. 

Security experts recommend that people who are interested in connecting to the Tor network should use at least one more added layer of security to encrypt and hide their identity. Preferably one which hides the fact that you are attempting to connect to the onion router and use the internet anonymously.

Can I use a Turbo VPN with Tor?

You can connect to a VPN service and then use that to connect to Tor. 

The first benefit of doing so is that your ISP will never find out that you are using Tor, neither will your local surveillance agencies, and any third parties attempting to view your online activity will also be confused. As they will only be able to see encrypted traffic between your computer and Turbo VPN’s servers. But since all encrypted traffic looks the same, from their perspective, they can never tell if you are using your VPN to browser Reddit or if you are using Tor.

Secondly, since you are communicating with the VPN servers and those servers in turn are sitting between you and the Tor relays, all of those Tor relays and entry-points will not know who is actually connecting to their network. Ensuring that you are secure from all directions. The connection to the onion network is actually happening through the VPN and your IP address is safe and secure, not exposed to anyone.

Why is dark web browsing without a VPN not secure?

Many people are of the opinion that dark web browsing on its own is secure enough without the need to add any extra measure but that is simply not true. There are still a lot of failure points in your security and even using a VPN without specific features designed to help you out might leave you exposed.

We talked about how the first entry-point in a Tor network has the potential to expose your real IP address, avoiding this is simple, you hide your real IP address from that first entry point. But at the same time, your ISP or any number of third parties can still view your packets going to a relay for the onion network.

Malicious Relays

Due to the anonymity of the dark web, it is extremely easy for malicious users to abuse this privacy and gather information on users that visit them. It is well known that law enforcement agencies are often the ones that set up Tor’s relays. When it comes to the onion network, a good rule of thumb is to not trust anything you see on it, and to cover yourself up in as many protective layers as possible. Tor’s protection is not enough.

Turbo VPN: how it can help you be safer on the dark web

Turbo VPN provides you with a VPN service that is fast, secure, easy to use, and set up. There is complete encryption between you and TurboVPN’s servers, and TurboVPN uses a strict no-logging policy. What does this all mean for you?

• Encrypted Traffic: No one attempting to wiretap your internet connection will ever be able to know what you are attempting to send or receive.
• VPN Traffic: Since you are communicating to a VPN, which is all they will be able to find out. To whom are you sending data? Who is sending the data back? Complete secrecy.
• No-Logging policy: Turbo VPN themselves do not keep a copy of the communication that takes place between you and their servers.

Kill Switch

This is where the best feature of Turbo VPN comes into play, Turbo VPN uses a kill switch to immediately shut off your internet connection in case your VPN stops functioning normally. While a bad VPN service will expose your real IP address in a situation like this, TurboVPN does not and protects your IP address and keeps it secret the moment something goes wrong in the network.

When it comes to selecting a VPN server, we would never recommend any without ensuring that it has a kill switch built-in, because the whole purpose of using a VPN is to keep your identity and your communication secure. TurboVPN does exactly that.

Conclusion

Now you know what kinds of .onion sites you should go to and how to access these sites safely. It's time to unblock all sites with Turbo VPN!