I have no interest in the dark web aside from general access if the internet is down and mirror sites.
Can downloading TOR get me there? I know nothing about this

The Pros and Cons of Using Tor for Online Privacy
Leave a Comment / December 29, 2015 / By Tracy Knauer

Tor lets you browse the Internet anonymously. But to use it effectively, you should understand what it does and what it doesn’t do. Here’s a concise summary of things to know about Tor.
As an online privacy solution, Tor offers lots of advantages. These include:

• It’s free.
• It’s relatively easy to set up and use. For most people, downloading and installing the Tor browser bundle is all it takes to get started.
• It supports all major operating systems.
• It makes it very difficult to identify your true IP address.
• It’s open source software. That means the code can be inspected by anyone, which reduces the risk that it contains malicious backdoors.
• It can be used at the same time as a VPN service or other proxy so that you have multiple layers of privacy protection.

But if you choose to use Tor you should also understand what it doesn’t do. Here are Tor’s limitations:

• It doesn’t encrypt your traffic. Anyone monitoring your connection could still read things like usernames and passwords that are transmitted in plaintext. Using a VPN or HTTPS encryption on top of Tor will protect against this.
• It’s not recommended for use with BitTorrent or other torrent clients. That’s because torrent clients will usually reveal your true IP address even if you attempt to configure them not to.
• It’s possible for people monitoring your Internet connection to know that you are using Tor, even if they can’t trace your IP address.
• Tor doesn’t anonymize Internet activity in apps other than the ones it’s specifically configured to protect. If you are using the Tor browser bundle, only your Web activity will be anonymized. Chat apps and other services won’t be. It’s possible to configure Tor to anonymize all Internet traffic, but that requires a fair bit of technical expertise. (Or you could use a platform like Tails OS, which comes with full Tor encryption built in.)
• Some software that runs inside your browser, like Flash apps, are usually not protected by Tor. You shouldn’t use them if you want to remain anonymous.
• Bandwidth speeds are often reduced when using Tor.

I prefer I2P to TOR and always within a non-logging VPN in a "safe" jurisdiction (not the "Five Eyes,"US, UH, NZ, Canada, Australia!).

TOR is "The Onion Router."  I2P is more analogous to "garlic" than "onions."  I2P is distributed among users. Users are themselves nodes sharing bits of traffic that os fragemnted then reassembled for the user. Because the nodes are constantly changing (users go offline, so they are no longer a node; other users log on and they become new nodes), every user is a moving target.

With TOR the nodes are identified and monitored, then traffic analysis of "metadata" can be accuмmulated to identify the user. As best I know that is not possible with I2P.

Experiment with I2P: https://geti2p.net/en/


The Invisible Internet Project (I2P)
What is I2P?
The Invisible Internet Project (I2P) is a fully encrypted private network layer that has been developed with privacy and security by design in order to provide protection for your activity, location and your identity. The software ships with a router that connects you to the network and applications for sharing, communicating and building.

I2P Cares About Privacy
I2P hides the server from the user and the user from the server. All I2P traffic is internal to the I2P network. Traffic inside I2P does not interact with the Internet directly. It is a layer on top of the Internet. It uses encrypted unidirectional tunnels between you and your peers. No one can see where traffic is coming from, where it is going, or what the contents are. Additionally I2P offers resistance to pattern recognition and blocking by censors. Because the network relies on peers to route traffic, location blocking is also reduced.

How to Connect to the I2P Network
The Invisible Internet Project provides software to download that connects you to the network. In addition to the network privacy benefits, I2P provides an application layer that allows people to use and create familiar apps for daily use. I2P provides its own unique DNS so that you can self host or mirror content on the network. You can create and own your own platform that you can add to the I2P directory or only invite your friends. The I2P network functions the same way the Internet does. When you download the I2P software, it includes everything you need to connect, share, and create privately.

An Overview of the Network
I2P uses cryptography to achieve a variety of properties for the tunnels it builds and the communications it transports. I2P tunnels use transports, NTCP2 and SSU, to hide the nature of the traffic being transported over it. Connections are encrypted from router-to-router, and from client-to-client(end-to-end). Forward-secrecy is provided for all connections. Because I2P is cryptographically addressed, I2P addresses are self-authenticating and only belong to the user who generated them.

I2P is a secure and traffic protecting Internet-like layer. The network is made up of peers ("routers") and unidirectional inbound and outbound virtual tunnels. Routers communicate with each other using protocols built on existing transport mechanisms (TCP, UDP, etc), passing messages. Client applications have their own cryptographic identifier ("Destination") which enables it to send and receive messages. These clients can connect to any router and authorize the temporary allocation ("lease") of some tunnels that will be used for sending and receiving messages through the network. I2P has its own internal network database (using a modification of the Kademlia DHT) for distributing routing and contact information securely.

About Decentralization and I2P
The I2P network is almost completely decentralized, with exception to what are called "Reseed Servers," which is how you first join the network. This is to deal with the DHT ( Distributed Hash Table ) bootstrap problem. Basically, there's not a good and reliable way to get out of running at least one permanent bootstrap node that non-network users can find to get started. Once you're connected to the network, you only discover peers by building "exploratory" tunnels, but to make your initial connection, you need to get a peer set from somewhere. The reseed servers, which you can see listed on http://127.0.0.1:7657/configreseed in the Java I2P router, provide you with those peers. You then connect to them with the I2P router until you find one who you can reach and build exploratory tunnels through. Reseed servers can tell that you bootstrapped from them, but nothing else about your traffic on the I2P network.

I see IP addresses of all other I2P nodes in the router console. Does that mean my IP address is visible by others?
Yes, this is how a fully distributed peer-to-peer network works. Every node participates in routing packets for others, so your IP address must be known to establish connections. While the fact that your computer runs I2P is public, nobody can see your activities in it. You can't say if a user behind this IP address is sharing files, hosting a website, doing research or just running a node to contribute bandwidth to the project.

What I2P Does Not Do
The I2P network does not officially "Exit" traffic. It has outproxies to the Internet run by volunteers, which are centralized services. I2P is primarily a hidden service network and outproxying is not an official function, nor is it advised. The privacy benefits you get from participating in the the I2P network come from remaining in the network and not accessing the internet. I2P recommends that you use Tor Browser or a trusted VPN when you want to browse the Internet privately.

Comparisons
There are a great many other applications and projects working on anonymous communication and I2P has been inspired by much of their efforts. This is not a comprehensive list of anonymity resources - both freehaven's Anonymity Bibliography and GNUnet's related projects serve that purpose well. That said, a few systems stand out for further comparison. The following have individual comparison pages:

Tor / Onion Routing
Freenet
The following are discussed on the other networks page:

RetroShare
Morphmix / Tarzan
Mixminion / Mixmaster
JAP
MUTE / AntsP2P
Haystack

I typed a 1200-word answer, then was timed out. Lost it all. Too tired to rebuild it.

Suffice it to say there is a large pool of committed and qualified cryptographers and programmers who review, vet, and surveil the darknet sites, services, VPNs. and software. The I2P directory has articles explaining their methods and findings.

Then one can vet every iota for themself OR take a leap of faith.

Thank you Mark79. When you are able, could you let me know if there would be access  or potential access through I2P even though the rest of the web is shut down?Thi s is what I've been hearing-hence my inquiries here

.
TOR is just a browser which needs the internet to work.
If the internet is down, TOR, running on your device, cannot work.

I2P is a browser, I assume, so ... same as TOR.
It cannot connect to something that is down.

You're looking for an alternate Internet? Better get a ham radio license AND get into a very niche area of ham radio. That's your only hope though.

Once you understand what the Internet is, you quickly understand that when it goes down, it goes down. Installing a piece of software is NOT going to give you some access to a "magical internet" that exists in the ether or something.

There is nothing magical about the Internet. I fully understand how computers are networked together, how traffic is routed, the DNS system, domain name resolution, etc.

The Internet is a conglomeration of 10's of thousands of routers, switches, hubs, and server hardware. And hundreds of thousands of miles of fiber optic and other cable -- mostly unguarded in the middle of nowhere.

Once you learn how fragile the Internet is, you become a Ham Radio operator :)

We have to be honest here though... Encrypted, unlicensed ham is where the interesting chatter happens, and you will need to understand encryption soon as well :) That is the true "dark web" and more of the underbelly of society than most people think runs on encrypted radio rather than the traditional web.

We have to be honest here though... Encrypted, unlicensed ham is where the interesting chatter happens, and you will need to understand encryption soon as well :) That is the true "dark web" and more of the underbelly of society than most people think runs on encrypted radio rather than the traditional web.

"Encyrpted, unlicensed ham" is a good way to end up in big trouble with the federales.  They can find your transmitter via triangulation, assuming they want to devote the resources.  You can't just go on the ham bands and start operating.  Licensing exists for a reason.

There is a pirate FM radio station near me operating on 87.7 mHz (that funky lower end of the FM band on which you used to be able to pick up audio on TV channel 6 before TV went all-digital), but I dare not speak of it on secular forums where my location is known, because you never know what boards the FCC monitors to find where the pirates are.   I don't want to rat them out.  And besides, there are no licensed FM radio stations on 87.7 mHz in the United States, it's not as though they're interfering with anything (though there could always be the claim that it interferes with air traffic control or public safety, a spurious charge at best).  The FCC is probably already aware, but chooses not to enforce at this time.  But it's always their prerogative.  I don't want to be the reason the station gets shut down.  It's an interesting alternative-media source.

I gave some thought to setting up a low-power FM station, but to remain legal I'd have only a 2 block radius of effective coverage, That wasn't worth the cost and I wasn't about to risk a bust for operating illegally. Not worth the risk…now.

At typical transmit power the FCC can find you almost instantly.

Historically, guns and radios are the first things seized. If you plan to even listen, you need to be on the move and without a predictable trajectory. Kind of like a ham radio version of the sniper's "shoot and scoot."

All I can say is that you are an interesting dude.

If you are ever unfortunate enough to come to Minnesota, I hope you will let me know in advance.

I could show you some things you might also find interesting.