I’m sure by now many of you have heard about Silk Road. It is the anonymous marketplace. It is the Amazon.com for all things illegal. And as anarchist activists we owe it to ourselves to at least understand its potential and browse its goods and services. I am going to give you the directions to Silk Road. I am also going to tell you where it leads.
Silk Road is not easy to get to, for various reasons. If you want to get there you are going to have to anonymize yourself online first. This is something you should have done a while ago as a self-respecting anarchist. If you haven’t yet taken the necessary steps to do so then we need to play some quick catch-up. There are two main ways to anonymize yourself online, Tor and VPN’s. Both have their pros and cons. To connect to Silk Road, however, only Tor will do.
Although Tor is amazing technology and continues to improve over time, it is not fail safe. To be sure, nothing is. This is why I encourage you to take every necessary precaution you can to protect yourself while online. I have said it before and I will continue to say it; if you are running a Windows operating system you need to switch to Linux. The future is open-source software and the sooner you make it your way of life the better off we will all be.
Even though I highly recommend running Linux full-time when online, it is not necessary in order to visit Silk Road. But you will need Tor. The full installation of Tor, however, can be confusing, especially for non-techies. Fortunately, running Tor has now been made extremely easy with the advent of Tor Browser. Simply follow the directions pertaining to your operating system and you will be running Tor in moments.
Once you have Tor running successfully you will need to direct your browser to the Silk Road URL. There you should be able to create an anonymous profile. But when you do so, please choose a username and password that you have never used before. It is better to be safe than sorry when visiting the internet’s red light district. [Editor's Note: As of December 2011 it seems that Silk Road has changed its address. Please visit the supposedly new Silk Road URL. Update: Silk Road has decided to remove the sale of weapons from the site and moved it to a new location called The Armory. Second Update: The Armory has been closed for lack of a healthy market.]
After you finish creating your profile you should be able to browse through a wide selection of illegal goods and services. For many people, myself included, this may be as close as they will come to trading in the first online free-market. If, however, you are eager to buy and sell on Silk Road, you will have to come into possession of Bitcoins. Although I have been, and continue to be, critical of the Bitcoin currency, I must admit that it has been an amazing facilitator of trade in the online black market, and for that I am happy to be wrong. Again, if you are going to start trading in Bitcoins you are far safer doing so on a Linux operating system. [Editor's Note: I no longer dislike Bitcoin and am actually a huge proponent of the alternative currency. Read I Was Wrong About Bitcoin to understand why I changed my mind.]
So, now that you know how to get to Silk Road I encourage you to do so, but with the utmost safety in mind. Silk Road, and its future competitors, will come under severe attack in the coming years. At the moment, the goods and services to be found on Silk Road are limited. But this is only because it is in its infancy. While psychedelic drugs and fully automatic rifles may seem wonderfully shocking at the moment, we must not limit our imaginations.
I fully suspect that other, more revolutionary, services will come about in time. Surely, professional assassins will offer their services as well. I believe this could open the door to contracts being put out on the lives of corrupt politicians, judges and police officers. After all, the idea of assassination markets has been floating around in anarchist circles for some time. Regardless of whether or not you condone violent insurrection against the state or state officials, these markets seem to me to be very likely to happen in the near future.
What other goods and services do you think are likely to pop up in an anonymous marketplace? I would love to read your ideas below.
its epic the perfect disobedience once again ppl have created not a website or a shop but an idea and ideas are bullet prove.
so why do ppl think to force an adult who knows the risks not to take what they call illegal drugs, Adults can take what ever the want no one gets hurt contrary to US gun laws who not only kill scores of ppl ever year but also enable syndicates and drug gangs in Mexico to rage a civil war.
The US should act in accordance with the policies and enforce them to make sure no US Gun is used in the Civil/Gang war in Mexico for puck sake 30 000 ppl got killed
And they worry about SR
What the puck is wrong with u
I never could understand what the Mexicans are getting so worked up about, I mean Mexican weed sucks unless its someone elses and then its pretty good especially if you chase it with a Marlboro red. But seriously, the number of people in jail for nonviolent possession is eye-popping. At this point it’s not even about the drugs. The government has built a huge bureaucracy around fighting drugs and to admit defeat or in my opinion just do what makes the most fucking sense and legalize drugs, would mean a huge collapse for everyone involved which is every damn law enforcement agency in the U.S. Thousands of people would lose their jobs. It would expose the sham that everybody knows as the War on Drugs which makes sites like SR even more unbelievable. But it also makes you wonder if at this point SR is getting a pass from the government. I mean Onion has been hacked so it would be possible to get personal information. Also think about all the drugs, guns, just anything illegal that gets delivered by the USPS. And this is in the era of fucking body scanners Total Recall style at airports. If onion had never been cracked I would trust it more. I mean if it can be hacked, that pretty much nulls the whole tor concept. But also as far as the government letting it slide, has anyone ever seen or heard about either a seller or buyer from SR being on trial, never, I’ve never heard of a conviction or even one single arrest, nothing. So if that’s the case, why is everybody so paranoid about it? Either way its safer and more convenient than ‘buying locally’. And this is off subject but have you noticed that the FBI or Interpol or whoever make Anonymous raids like once a week and each time they get like 60 or 70 people. How many fucking people are in Anonymous? And why do people in a club called Anonymous keep getting caught? They need to sit down and figure out how to either stay anonymous or change their name to like Not-so-Anonymous. I mean I’m all for wargame hacking shit but I wouldn’t call myself Keyser Soze and then go rob a liquor store. Just saying, I first thought Anonymous was the name of poetry club for shy people. I’m just kidding Anonymous, Natalie Portman IS pretty hot, so recognize. But anyway, I’m rambling and I’ve got to get on SR and order some mo Lo Zi ®ose. Hey hey hey… smoke weed everyday!
Hahahah!
absolutely my man can you give me some advice on how the F. to get the silkroad on my android phone 2.2.2 froyo not rooted or aint it possible. im totally computer iliterate i aint got a F. clue i liked your bit on annon who should become not so annon i was peeing myself literally anyway if you can reply if you cant help not a prob keep up the funny coments king seth…………
Dude, trying to describe what you would need to do is totally out of the question. Your not just computer illiterate, your common sense illiterate. Dont even bother trying to step forward with this, as someone with your small brain will miss a step and end up strait in prison. On another thought, go ahead! Id rather idiots be imprisoned anyways
PEACE!
While Sir 1 was a dunce with no punctuation skills, you didn’t have to be a rude cocksucker to him…cocksucker.
Essentially, the Government likes to give the general population the idea that they are in control. They accomplish this by conducting raids on n00bs for minor DDOS’ing / SQL injection (that previously would have gone unnoticed), and claim that they arrested members of “Anonymous”. This of course is pure hilarity, given the fact that “Anonymous” can represent any solitary person or group with conflicting beliefs. “Anonymous” isn’t a group that the government can arrest or control, they are everyone. “Anonymous” is purely a dummy name used by individuals to hype up their attacks/ divert attention away from themselves, or government officials to trump up charges, or Mainstream media to create sensationalist stories they can sell to the public. .
You need to get a punk/emo girl skin site to advertise on your site. I’d PaTrONiZ and I’d start spreading the word about this tight sight that drops anarchy from the streets to the bedroom or wherever my punk girlfriend wanna be anarchy. I read all 177 comments and am amazed at the change in perception of SR and I think I know why… continued dialogue, shared experience, and the fact that we love weed, LOVE IT! Probably always will! But not as much as I love pussy! The end.
Goddamn this some good weed, $50 a gram soaked in pure hash oil. I’m gonna smoke some mo then go buy me a hooka with some motherfucking bitcoins… what do i get for 5 bit coins? Everyting you want. Everything? Everyting, sock it to me lol.
I have been trying for a few days now to access the silk road using the Tor-enabled Covert Browser app for the iPad 2. I can get to both the login page and the registration page, but that is it. I have created about six different usernames and whenever I attempt to login the subsequent page is just blank. Can anyone help me? I would greatly appreciate it.
I am also stuck here even with the iPad 3….any fixes or updates on getting it working?
I’m having the same problem has anyone found away yet??
Sounds a little phishy. Did you manually set the network proxy in settings? What address for SR are using? Can you access other onion sites? What’s your credit card number? (just making sure you were awake)
I don’t mean to sound like a total idiot, but I didn’t know I had to manually set anything. How do I do that? The address I am using is the one that Wikipedia has posted. I have been able to access The Black Market .onion site. But had a similar problem in terms of getting past the registration page into the actual site. I dont know what I’m doing wrong.
I took a look at the covert browser app and the description did not explicitly say that additional configuration was required. I use jailbroken software and added Tor manually. When it’s enabled I have to set a different proxy. I’ll download the app (for free lol, thank you jailbroken phone) just to take a look. As a rule, if you can connect to one onion site you should be able to connect to all of them. One last question, were you running 3G or wifi when you tried to connect to SR?
I am using wi-fi. My iPad doesn’t have 3G.
That was a pointless question, I’ve been using a jailbroken system for so long, it’s a little like apples and oranges. Just out of curiosity, if you go under settings and select Wi-Fi and click the blue arrow next to the network you are connected to then scroll to the bottom of the page and look under the heading HTTP proxy, what are server and port set to?
Ok, so I’m at work and connected to the wi-fi. I started my covert browser app and it to,d me that I was connected to Tor. So I went to network settings and it says that my http proxy is set to “off” should I switch it to “manual” or “auto”?
I haven’t had a chance to sit down and completely dissect it but I did download the browser and at first glance it looks like an emulator similar to Skyfire and flash. Did you notice how the SR screen was really blurry. This can indicate a remote connection. I attempted starting a new account and it took me to your blank screen. Also, when I re-read the description, I kept seeing the phrase Tor like (???). The proxy list looks like a Tor proxy list but that means nothing. I mean I can spoof telephone numbers and email accounts directly from my iPhone. I’ll look at it more this evening but so far it’s a FAIL.
Hey man, so I finally figured it out and just downloaded tor toggle from cydia. So I’m in! Thanks for all your help, though. It was nice of you to take the time.
I’ve tried to login to SR For abut 2 days now and I have ever had an account but i says im using open proxy i turned both off n my firewall is off also and it wont let me register !? HELP!
Sometimes simply clearing your history, cache and cookies (if cookies are applicable) will solve the problem of blank pages, pages not loading right, etc. Mozilla told me to do this when I asked them about a similar problem and it worked right away. Whew. If anyone else has had the same prob, give this a go and let us know if it corrected things for you. I’ve bashed my brains out for hours over issues like this, only to find that I could have done a simple action to fix it. Go figure…
Forgot: What I basically do is take a mozilla clearbrowser fix, then apply it to Tor. Have gotten more hits than misses doing this.
Why were we even having that conversation if you had access to Cydia? You don’t even need the ‘covert’ browser plus I mentioned the word jailbroken no less than three times. Whatever, glad you figured it out.
I admit that using Tor to access black market sites like SR eliminates many unnecessary hassles when buying drugs but might it also eliminate a certain mind set important for self preservation? In my opinion, there is an amount of added satisfaction that you can taste when you score some fire in the real world. Now I get frustrated when I’m waiting for an order for made up digital currency to fill and find myself checking the mailbox like I’m expecting a secret decoder ring. I’m not blaming SR or Tor, but nobody ever mentions the completely demented, sociopathic element that Tor has also gifted the cloak of anonymity that I have come to purposefully ignore in exchange for access to sites like SR. Tor might protect your privacy but it doesn’t sterilize the unintended consequences of your decision to use it. And this being an anarcho capitalist site which holds the nonaggression axiom so near and dear, maybe those unintended consequences shouldn’t be ignored. There must be a better way. But that’s just my opinion. So good luck to everyone. I’m out.
You just took the words right outta my mouth. One needs to think before acting, simply said. There is no such thing as the perfect protection from consequences to actions.
whats the withdrawal PIN ON SR
You make one up when you register in that blank box beside the word:PIN
So what is the current link to silk road
http://silkroadvb5piz3r.onion/
What’s the current link for Silk Road ?
Hey, I’ve been trying to access silk road on mozilla with Vidalia for a few days now with no luck. I’ve got the browser saying that it is connected to Tor but I can’t access any onion sites or anything like that. I’ve cleared all my history, played around with the proxy connections and still no luck, if anyone could help that would be much appreciated….
OK, so I’m not a crypto-capitalist-anarchist. I’ve lived long enough to recognize that some rules are needed because the world is full of assholes and without rules those of us who aren’t can and do get screwed. Once upon a time, we crated governments to control wackos and nutcases but the biggest problem as far as I can tell is that the world’s assholes have gained control of governments. If only the world was the way it ought to be (with freedom to behave like a responsible adult and with assholes labeled appropriately) but it isn’t. Reality sucks a lot of the time and responsible non-assholish adults gets screwed all the time. I was an adult when the so called war on drugs was declared and to me it was obviously lost the day it was declared. Indeed, there’s been so much money ‘invested’ in this ludicrous war that to end it would mean tens of thousands of jobs and a good many personal fortunes lost. That these would be replaced is naturally lost on the authorities. What is so damned shocking is that American society learned nothing from Prohibition. With that single monumental act of largely Protestant hubris, organized crime was created. Ending prohibition didn’t end organized crime and no sooner did Prohibition end, then the authorities began criminalizing drugs. Think of all the money that has been wasted on trying to control human vice? Booze, drugs, sex…. For crissakes, when will society learn that it can’t control vice. Forget it: If society hasn’t learned by now it won’t ever happen. Netherlands has made it illegal to sell grass to tourists because Dutch trading partners got pissed off. Amsterdam was about as open a place for vice as I’ve ever seen but that’s ending.
Reality: If the authorities decide to crack down on Silk Road or Bitcoin, that is what they will do and anyone who honestly thinks they can hide…well, good luck. The assholes in charge will arrest as many people as it takes and the really scary thing is that they can get away with it. World governments need absolute control over their populations and they aren’t going to let anything stop this from happening. Until massive numbers of people simply refuse to cooperate with the authorities, personal freedoms will continue to erode. Sadly, something as simple as non-cooperation seems beyond the willingness of most people. I found my way to this web site because I read about the move towards cashless society and started following links. Governments dislike cash transactions because they can’t be tracked. In the name of a senseless war on drugs or an never ending GWOT, governments will take whatever steps are necessary to win. That these wars can only be won by enslaving people is rather lost of those in charge but whats a little slavery compared to winning?.
Thanks for the rant, Indubio. I’m in the same pew… and the only hope I see is the same one that’s emerging in the Arab States, etc– that the “ones in charge” become disgusted at waging war on their own people.
Barring that, maybe something like the Doukhobors used in the 30s in Canada- walking into the nearest town stark naked- the whole damn’ village- will get someone’s attention. Maybe if everyone who has ever smoked weed simply confessed, and reported dutifully to the nearest jail/courthouse/etc for arraignment would move things a little.
Godspeed! (& happy trails…) ^..^
Hey, I downloaded the Tor bundle and I am able to get the Vidalia control, but I am not showing any firefox browser. Do I need to click on something on the Tor control? Totally technically retarded. Please help!!
The Tor Browser should open up automatically after Vidalia finishes connecting.
You are on firefox. Just click on that orange tab on the upper rt corner and you’ll get a popout. Click “options” and they too will pop out. It’s firefox.
Ok, but where and how does it open? Do I need to shut down all of the MS browser windows? I’m just not seeing anything but the Vidalia control panel. No browser window opens…..Sorry!
Are you running Windows OS? If so, I can’t help you. My personal experience is that all of the really cool FOSS doesn’t work worth shit on Windows. Switch to Linux. You’ll find most of your problems go away.
If you ARE running Linux and having these problems, then I’m stumped. Because you can have your normal Firefox browser open and still open up the Tor Browser at the same time. They are two separate applications, essentially.
You just have to be patient and wait. It often takes some time before it opens the browser. Don’t freak out, it will open in time.
why can’t i find the current site address ? any help plz ?
thx soo much
Go to the wiki and copy and paste it in your tor browser from there.
I downloaded tor and most sites say that info is encrypted. I can log into SR, but browser says its not encrypted. I am running mac os and downloaded the tor bundle. Thank you for your help!
i tried to enter with tor but i can enter only in the armory, when I try to enter in the normal market it show me a blank page and then say that the time for connection is finished. Why?
What if I forget my password? I just open 2 accounts on silk road and transfered money to it through mtgox but I cannot remember the password for some reason. How do I access my money now?
Has anyone had issues trying to get on SR lately? I know I have the updated URL and I’m running my Tor browser bundle just like I normally do, but it keeps giving me a “The connection has timed out” error saying the server is taking too long to respond. Is anyone else having this problem? It’s super annoying considering I haven’t changed anything and I’ve never had issues before.
Silk Road is not phishy…. you need to get off all y’alls iPads and get on a real computer. Tor browser works so flawlessly that other sites I use 10 times a day wont let me on because they think someone in Abu Dabai is trying to hack my account. It’s in SilkRoads best interest to change their URL as much as possible, so just keep searching for it until you find it. Write down your name, password, and PIN on a seperate sheet of paper and use names and passwords completely unrelated to you or any that you’ve used before. This is beginning aranchists 101… Just dont be stupid!
Hey question please.. I went on figured it all out signed up tried t log in and fail..
any ideas, thoughts, or solutions. Thank you for your time. I’m so fucking close
can anyone help me with ….ive dowloaded tor st all that up i can get on to the silkroad login page an make a username but it just wont let me log in ive tried countless times/ usernames
i keep getting times out also….sucks
im getting pretty aggitated with the site being down, ive been trying to access it since 6-4 and the server is taking too long to respond, blah blah blahh. i understand it goes down from time to time but how long is it usually down? hmmmm
Is the site down?
Yeah I think it’s down.
Yup. Its down
If they are switching to a new address I wish they would tell user’s prior, even to ones with only recent purchases to make sure old accounts or bogus ones do not get it but the people who matter do. Also site might just be down for a bit, who knows.
K try silkroadvb5piz3r.onion/silkroad/home it just worked.
I just found out about the site for the first time, downloaded Tor, and try to access the site, but it keeps telling me it times out, even with that address given nothings working. Any other suggestions?
Your computer might be to slow or your connection.
Yeah, jailbreak your phone, download tor and macx4, works everytime and it pulls SR up immediately, you can also use public wifi, use bitcoin buddy moneypak to bitcoin, he charges a margin but he’s a lot easier than these bitcoin exchanges, and if you have any other questions go to the onion tordir
And in the past, if the address changes it will redirect so that’s not the problem, TorDir or wiki for onion has everything you need to know the held are *censored* and *censored*
http://www.textfiles.com/anarchy/
Write it down before it gets censored
Hello I am having trouble connecting to SR, my tor browser is connected and online but when I put in the address for SR I keep getting the unable to connect message. Firefox cannot establish a connect to the server.
I have tried looking for aurora program on my firewall menu to allow it but I can’t find it?
I have tried refreshing heaps of times, using cc cleaner as someone suggested and even turning of my firewall protection but nothing has made any difference.
Any help would be gratefully received. Thanks
I hop on Silk Road periodically just to make sure everything is still running smoothly. It works for me no problem. Also, I get over 20,000 people to this page every month, so I have to assume the vast majority of them are not having any issues. I wish I could help the few of you that have the problem of not being able to connect, but I cannot. Perhaps try another computer.
On a side note, I’ve just visited The Armory again today. It seems to be getting more awesome listings. Check it out!
Hmm, the Tor browser does seem a bit erratic. I had the same problem, then tried a search engine on Tor called The Abyss, which they say is more stable. Anyway I did a search for Silk Road then clicked the link and it loaded fine.
Dunno, it might help:-)
ok, I’ve signed into Silk Road, the URL was on Wikipedia (wtf this is supposed to be difficult!).
I’m immediately suspicious and a search shows it listed all over the place too. Then browsing a URL list in Tor I find the same URL described as a scam. I’m not surprised, but it looks real enough. But I don’t expect an onion site to have the name in it either. Can someone confirm that this is NOT the real SR please?
Love the idea of silkroad. Drug prohibition doesn’t work, endangers and indeed ends, lives. Ruins families and puts people away for life for silly reasons. The sooner something like the Silkraod blows up and starts sending out drugs by the truckload the better. If only people weren’t so scared of law enforcement. Personal usage and small quantities will general keep anyone safe. Just don’t go stupid and get done for trafficking. A fine, and drug diversion is probably the most that would happen for people with small, sub-trafficking amounts.
The armory sort of scares me., i like living in Australia where there are no guns. The idea any nut can buy one online for a grand is unnerving. Getting guns in Australia isn’t like the U.S.A or other places. I would have found it impossible to buy one before the Armory. (not that I want one).
Thanks for the article.
Long live the freedom to control your own body and mind!
this would be great, if it were not both fearmongering and just a plain ol bad idea.
1: dispite what anarchists tell you, laws are there to protect people.
2: stop treating anarchy like a style choice. its not a game and not for fun.
3: drugs in small doses? that would be great if they were not addictive and spiral out of control. take a little bit of crack? that will work for as long as that ammount still gets you high, then you need more and more untill you cant function.
4: smoke weed everyday? its scientificaly proven to lower your inteligence, especially if used in your teens. going to be dumb as shit every day.
5: as for the guns… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCtD3OJ-_Es that song about says it. (keep in mind the sarcasm) deaths would spike, and there would be no way to stop it.
grow up, stop being so damned gullible, and stop thinking about yourselfs and start thinking about what would be better for everyone, because shit like this is not it.
Ive been trying to make a user name on silk road for days now and no matter what i put in for a user name it says its taken? is that really the case or am i missing something?
wheee!!!!!
I want to sell research chemicals and generic meds here. How do I go about it? Can some1 direct me personally on how to proceed?
Linux will never be the future, and I personally hope to never see it become such. Once an operating system becomes popular it becomes a target for viruses and malwhare and other problems, just look at mac os
I did everything the video said, but it still come to a page that tells me the page I’m trying to get to isn’t available?
contact me directly for research chemicals and herbal blends at papa7000 at gmail dot com
i lould like to sell research chemicals and ecsacy with other drugs on the website but i dont know how can anyone help me please
gchem4 at gmail dot com