Kulturowe aspekty dark web: Przegląd badań
Cultural aspects of the Dark Web: Research review

Summary/Abstract: The article contains a review of research on the cultural aspects of the Dark Web. A semi-systematic literature review was used for this purpose, as such an approach enables the reviewing of a multi- or interdisciplinary research area. Scopus, an international and multidisciplinary database indexing academic publications, was the source of bibliographic data. It turned out that there is a relatively short history of research on the cultural aspects of the Dark Web. The first publications on the topic only appeared in the Scopus database in 2005, and it continues to be a niche area of research, with the annual number of indexed publications around a few dozen. The author distinguished the following groups of issues that researchers deal with: (1) motivations among Dark Web users for making use of this part of the internet; (2) the impact of the Dark Web’s existence and the anonymity it provides on human behaviour; (3) the specificity of trading activity on “dark markets”; (4) steps taken by illegal traders to gain a reputation and customer trust; (5) communication practices on discussion forums; (6) the freedom to disseminate information; and (7) the methodology for studying communities on “dark networks”.

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